Biowham: Reynauds?

[CtResident]

(I pulled this out of your Somatiform topic so I wouldn't derail it on you.)

You had mentioned your hands being cold, but not turning white or going through color changes which would be Reynaud's.

Two winters back I was shoveling snow and my hands hurt so very badly. The fingertips were vivid red and I had to stop immediately, it was excrutiating! Didn't matter if I put on two sets of gloves. So the pcp put me on nifedipine for the winter and that seemed to help. (Plus the idea that I didn't shovel snow, son did it, hmmmm.)

Last winter, I didn't go on any meds, problem seemed to be gone.

This past October, my hands were feeling icy already. So pcp and I said it's going to be a long winter if I'm feeling it this early in the year, go back on the nifedipine. The dosage was different; not in a tablet that I could cut in half. Was a capsule that made me feel like I had a dough head on top of a straw, uhhh, carrying my head to bed at night felt awful. And got a flushed face too! Did it help my hands? NO. I finished the last of the Rx last week and I won't renew it, even if there is a bit o' winter to get through. Why pay $65. for something useless?

I did see a woman in the fall who had been out in the cold and her hands did change color. The weirdest thing I ever saw. She was not on meds. (eeek!!) Didn't want to be on meds either, seemed to think it was a non-event. She would rub her hands for a while and that was that.

Long story short: I am starting to think I don't have Reynaud's. How is it diagnosed? Could it be that my on-again, off-again hyper-sensitivity to cold is part of an MS package?

Thanks,
Suzanne  

[CtResident]

My hands never went from white to blue to red. Just pure red. I read somewhere that the pain was from the capillaries spasming.

So it sounds like a 50/50 on the diagnosis.......maybe kinda sorta but who knows.

As for the meds, the nifedipine is a calcium channel blocker. (Maybe you're heard of Procardia?)

As I understand it, it's a heart medication used to lower blood pressure. I was running on the low end of normal, so that's why the pcp told me to take it before bed, so I wouldn't get dizzy. I didn't want to wear my flushed face in public anyway!

Lately I noticed my b/p is more towards normal, so I can't figure it out! How does something supposed to lower high b/p cause a rise in b/p in someone who runs with low/normal b/p????

Call me Dorky but I wear socks. Sometimes even to bed. Feet get cold but no pains.

Shoveled snow today, not on nifedipine, no pain. So, no Raynaud's?

I am thinking this should go onto my timeline.

Suzanne

[Momzilla]

I get this in my feet only, and boy, does it hurt.  I sometimes get it even when it's not particularly cold.  I don't take medication for it, didn't know there was any.  But lately, this past winter, I do wear socks when it's cold, which I've never done before -- socks are dorky, if you didn't know.

The pain I get from Raynaud's is very different from the burning//tingling I get elsewhere in my feet these past couple of years.  The Raynaud's seems to be just under the surface, more tangibly in my toes, and tips of my feet.  The other pain and tingling is far, far deep in my feet, closer to where I perceive my bone to be.  And I get the newer pain in the "balls" of my heel very deeply.  That kills!  And when I've walked for a long time, I get tingling or burning.  But it's different from the Raynaud's, definitely.  I wish I could describe it better.  

I get Raynaud's very slightly in my fingers, and it hurts, and I'm sensitive to the cold, but it's not "blotchy" spots of white, purple and red like in my feet.  My fingers never turn blue.  Just white to red.  And I scare my boys with my feet.  I just have to show them when they're colored funny, and they're grossed out.  My fingers never have the same effect.  

Anyway, i thought I'd add my two cents.

Zilla*

[biowham]

The color change is relatively specific for Raynauds. It's also very painful, usually, as the hands undergo the color/temperature change. With cold---->warm, the hands will go from white to blue to red. With that same sequence, the pain will appear and be burning, tingling, etc. (cvasospasm). Raynauds can be primary--i.e., the only thing you've got and the only thing causing these symptoms--or secondary, i.e., resulting from the effects of some other disorder, like scleroderma or a thyroid problem. Smokers will feel this worse.

E