I have been reading about trauma being a trigger for PsA ever since I double sprained my "good" ankle, the one that never bugged me before I sprained it twice in 5 weeks. This was interesting:
OMG I totally agree. The thought had crossed my mind, but my right forefoot is the culprit for me. I had 3 stress fractures in the period of 12 mos in that area and since then it has given me fits. Very interesting at that...
This is true for me. I was in a full remission while on Enbrel the first time 11 years ago (mountain biking, hiking, full of energy, you name it). Then I had an internal bleed and needed 2 emergency surgeries in 2 weeks. Within 2 weeks of the last surgery my body flared and nothing could stop it. I've been struggling to regain some control since then.
I found this article to be really interesting. I sprained an ankle several years ago, and the visible, considerable swelling lasted for three years. Never did get full range of motion back. Two-plus years ago I had what should have been minor hand surgery, and that has set off a downward spiral I'm still on.
When I was first diagnosed with psoriasis, it showed up in the aftermath of a nasty allergic reaction to a drug. My dermatologist said that was common- an insult to the skin often triggers psoriasis.
The article mentions prednisone making PsA worse! Has anyone heard of this, read anything elsewhere?
I'm mid-flare (I say mid-flare because my Remi infusion is in a week!) due to a massage. Yep - "trauma" caused by a massage given to me by my massage therapist. We knew there was a chance of this happening, due to the deep work she needed to do and the particular issues I was having, but WOW, I couldn't believe how aggressively my body reacted.
Makes some sense. I don't remember having left arm trouble until 2003 when between helping my husband dig out the shrubs in front of our house and grating a LOT of cabbage and carrots on July 4, I did something to it. Not sure it ever healed.
Now I'm looking at shoulder replacement surgery because I can't raise my arm over my head, can't pull my hair back, can't drive, can't, can't, can't more than I can.
This web site was worth reading. I had back surgery and that is when the tiny amount of Psoriasis I had flared up and got worse and increased and increased over my body. I also stubbed my big toe and couldn't get a shoe on my foot for a year, nothing much showed in the xrays which I insisted they did again and look at it from a different angle and still nothing. Eventually all my toes swelled up like fat little sausages and that is when I was finally diagnosed with PSA, this swelling has gone but there is now permanent damage to these toes. I have had sprained ankles with a chipped bone and torn a ligament then I had PSA in my ankles for a long while and now it has moved on into other joints.
Not every joint that I have PSA in has had trauma to it, but I do feel like my back surgery did escalate this disease where before I had only had bouts of it which came and went.
Nym mentions massage as a trigger. Probably the worst pain I've ever had was from a massage 25 years ago. I felt great when she finished, not so good by the time I was dressed, and could barely get out of the car without help by the time I drove home. This was following a TMJ surgery which had caused my whole upper body to rebel something fierce. Now, of course, I'm wondering about the underlying reasons for both the TMJ problem and the post-surgical problems.
I think my PsA always popped up in abused joints. And it would go away in those joints when I took away the source of stress. My knee flared up when I was biking, then after I stopped, it calmed down. My neck got super stiff because I had a bad pillow. I got a new pillow and got physical therapy and my neck got better. I started getting TMJ I think because I was using an awful bite guard that locked my jaw in place. Since then I got a bike guard that lets my mouth move around and the TMJ improved. Finally a finger swelled up after bowling... it was the middle finger on my right hand. I continued to assault the finger by biking. I was nice to it and had occupational therapy and it got better.
This last time my knee flared from biking I didn't want to stop the biking. I want to be able to live MY life and I don't want to turn into an out of shape, middle-aged fat guy. (Instead I'm an in-shape, middle-aged, fat guy). So I got the problem diagnosed and I went on a biologic. Almost two years and counting I can do what I want and I'm not having flares.
I’ve always had arthritis since being born mainly in my left leg I had an operation on it at about 3 years old and it rarely bothered me only in winter up until 3 years ago I had a stressful situation with my little boy which I won’t go into as its a long story but ever since then the Psa has been relentless in causing me problems and pain so I do believe stress makes Psa worse the stress has gone away a long time ago but the Psa I can’t seem to get under control