This Is MS Multiple Sclerosis Community: Knowledge & Support

Hello all. I am a 40 year old woman and have not been diagnosed with anything yet. 4 years ago, I had an episode of pain and tingliness in my left arm along with a "heavy" feeling and shoulder blade that went away within a week and was never diagnosed. I have also been dizzy off and on for probably 10 years or so, but it always goes away within a day or 2. 3 weeks ago, I started to get dizzy all the time and then 2 weeks ago, I got the same left arm tingling from before, only worse. I also now in the past few days have been feeling tingling in my face and my right hand and some lower back pain. I think tingling in my legs too, but I also think I am in denial and holding on to the possibility of this "just" being a pinched nerve. I am pretty terrified and my GP has done some basic blood tests (slightly high white count 10.4). He did xrays of my neck to check for pinched nerve (that was before the other tingling started), but haven't heard back yet, expect to hear back today. He mentioned that next step would be a brain MRI, but that it might be hard to get insurance to approve. Should I be seeing a neurologist before the MRI? Are there things about the MRI that a neurologist might specify that the GP won't? Don't want to do it twice b/c I am claustrophobic and had an MRI on my foot 1.5 years ago for a bad cellulitis infection and that was hard to do and my head wasn't even in the machine. Appreciate any advice you can give me. Thanks.

hey there, welcome to the forum. i think you'd do well to see the neuro sooner rather than later.

magnesium may help calm some of your anxiety surrounding the mri procedure. it's very calming. but if you decide to use that approach a lot of care is needed to ensure absorption. just fyi.

anyway, welcome again, lots of support here if you have further questions

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my approach: no meds so far - just balanced whole foods (partial 'paleo', much less outright elimination), science, supplements, & bloodwork
my regimen - www.thisisms.com/ftopict-2489.html
www.whfoods.com, www.nutritiondata.com

Hi Becky - There are Standard MRI protocols for MS; one for the brain and another for the cervical spine.

http://www.ajnr.org/content/27/2/455/T1.expansion.html This is the brain protocol.
http://www.ajnr.org/content/27/2/455/T2.expansion.html This is the c-spine protocol.

If you don't like time in the tube, I'd see a neurologist and make sure you have the right studies done

Kyle

one other question - was staph aureus the bacterial culprit when you had cellulitis?

_________________
my approach: no meds so far - just balanced whole foods (partial 'paleo', much less outright elimination), science, supplements, & bloodwork
my regimen - www.thisisms.com/ftopict-2489.html
www.whfoods.com, www.nutritiondata.com

Thank you for the feedback. As for the cellulitis, they never determined what organism I was infected with. I had already been on oral antibiotics for 2 days when I was admitted to the hospital, but it was one of the worst cases they had ever seen, so they ran tests to make sure it wasn't necrotizing fasciitis. My liver values and a few other values were also way off when I came in so I wonder if I wasn't starting to go septic too. I switched antibiotics several times before the infection finally started receding instead of spreading and was on IV antibiotics at home for a month after. Not a fun experience and my son was 8 weeks old at the time. I developed lyphedema in that foot during my pregnancy that hadn't gone away and doctors gave me no indication of the danger I was in for infection. I will have to wear a compression stocking on that leg for the rest of my life. Sorry, this is an MS board, I got a little off topic there.

no problem.

given your pregnancy being concurrent with edema, infection, cellulitis, elevated (i presume) liver enzymes, etc, i would strongly suspect an issue with zinc. pregnancy places a high demand on your zinc resources. i'll dig out another study showing that zinc can drop during pregnancy even when supplemented. but for now, a study on liver enzymes in zinc deficiency:

Dietary zinc deficiency induced-changes in the activity of enzymes and the levels of free radicals, lipids and protein electrophoretic behavior in growing rats.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12049850
"The present study was conducted to investigate the effects of adequate Zn level (38 mg/kg diet, as a control) and two low levels that create Zn deficiencies (19 mg/kg diet, 1/2 of the control and 3.8 mg/kg diet, 1/10 of the control) in growing male and female rats for 10 weeks... Zinc deficiency increased (P<0.05) liver aspartate aminotransferase (AST) and alanine aminotransferase (ALT) activities in a dose-dependent manner..."

have any of your docs ever tested your serum zinc levels?

_________________
my approach: no meds so far - just balanced whole foods (partial 'paleo', much less outright elimination), science, supplements, & bloodwork
my regimen - www.thisisms.com/ftopict-2489.html
www.whfoods.com, www.nutritiondata.com

BeckyBear,
You are better off seeing a Lyme doctor (llmd). I have read stories such as yours for so many women. It is very possible that the infection you had for cellulitis was lyme disease. Main stream medicine won't even acknowledge this infection and it is currently the MOST CONTROVERSIAL disease in the history of medicine. You should educate yourself about the controversy and how it takes a long time to treat with antibiotics. Most people have more than just Lyme as they have coinfections like bartonella, babesia, mycoplasma, cpn and others. A neurologist won't even consider these infections. Lyme disease mimics MS. If I were you I would get your medical records and check and see if they tested you for lyme and if they did, what test was used. I would find out which antibiotic you used back then and I would find a llmd (lyme literate md). there is no cure or treatment that will help you for ms, however most people get better when the proper antibiotic combination is found for these infections. Lyme disease is a serious disease, there are laws in 8 states right now to protect doctors who treat long term lyme with long term antibiotics. Medical boards are going after doctors who treat lyme disease longer than the recommended 3 weeks, so doctors out of fear will not acknowledge these diseases. yeah...unbelievable but true. the most effective medicine for ms is the combination of minocycline + copaxone...minocycline coincidentally is a very effective drug for lyme and bartonella. if anything ask your doctor for minocycline if he thinks ms because then you are covering both. hope this leads you in the right direction.