client with SO much systemic inflammation!

[carrieo2guns]

I have an interesting client...

28-yo female has been seeing me monthly for the past 5-6 mos or so. She has fibromyalgia, lupus, and tse tse chondritis (which is an inflammation of the rib heads or something), which is manifesting in both front and possibly back, and now she's scheduled to see a rheumatoid arthritis specialist to see if she possibly has that as well. She's been on steroids before, hasn't really helped much except that she has gained a good bit of weight and since she's bigger boned in the first place, though she carries it well, she's understandably self-conscious about it.

The tse tse chondritis has been her chief complaint over the past couple of months (the fibro and the lupus have stabilized--not great, but have taken a back seat to the tse tse). She feels it as a big noticeable knot in the area of her right pec, near the right edge of the sternum. She ALSO feels something now in her left l mid-to-lower thoracic area, close to the spine. It's not tied to any particular action or position. In fact, it shows up only when she has been asleep for 4-6 hours or longer. She's fine when she goes to bed and then about 4 hours later it starts in and it often wakes her up in the middle of the night. It takes most of the morning before she feels normal again. She sleeps on her side (either one--she often switches throughout the night). No type of stretching or exercise thus far has helped or examassageplanetated it.

We did some biofeedback (with my electronic machine, the one that's so good for inflammation) today, just some spot treatment on those 2 areas, so I'm going to email/call her tomorrow to see if that helped. In the past, I've done hot stone on her, which we don't do anymore, because she said the manual massage was better for her, which was cool.

Right now she just comes mainly for relaxation, because other than the biofeedback, that's all I can currently think of to do. (I have about 250 hrs of St. John-based NMT, but we didn't really go over exactly what to do for stuff like fibromyalgia, and I hadn't even HEARD of Tse Tse Chondritis before!) But I'd like to help her more than JUST relaxation, if I can, so I guess I'm just trying to see if y'all have any ideas or pointers I may have missed or additional suggestions or whatnot. (Her common denominator is that all of these ailments are inflammatory in nature, and that's screaming something to me but I'm not sure what. I think that somehow I CAN help, but I just can't put my finger on it yet.)

Thanks in advance!
Hugs,
~Jyoti

 

[Karo]

The tse tse chondritis diagnosis is very interesting! I had never heard of it, so googled it - has she been bitten by the African tsetse fly?? If so, and that has caused that specific inflamation, I'd suspect that is the source of all the inflamation. It sounds like this is more of a heart condition that causes the inflamation of the cartilage at the rib heads.

I think I'd ask her to get a second opinion. If it is simply costal chondritis, I wouldn't be so concerned. Then there is no heart involvement.

As far as massage, I think I would specifically work the surrounding muscle tissue - the intercostals, pecs, serratus and obliques especially. If they are hypertonic and pulling on the ribs, they could contribute to the inflamation and pain. Otherwise, it's inflamation - the doctor should have told the ct. to RICE it.

 

[Top_Gear_Biggest_Fan]

:2cents: from up north...
My wife suffers from Fibromyalgia, and for her the solution was the following... She went vegetarian, and started taking Magnesium & Malic Acid (18 caps/day if I remember), and started doing yoga. The first two were by doctor script; the last was on his advice (yes this advice was from a traditionally trained MD). This took about a year to clear most of the symptoms. She is now mostly free, with only minor flair-ups. For her I do head to toe relaxation focused work twice/month, and Reflexology every 2nd or 3rd evening before bed. When she does have a flair-up, Reflexology seems to be the trick. She now teaches yoga (5 classes/week) and doesn't have to take the Mag./Malic.
I limited cross fiber work, and did gentle striping with O/I compression work. Working trigger points was done carefully so as not to aggravate the fibro points. Those areas I concentrated on doing only MLD work, and made sure there was good lymph flow proximal to the spot.

Darren

 

[Shelby]

I have never heard of 'tse tse chondritis' but I know about costo-chondritis, which is very painful and has similar causes to intercostals myalgia.


renauddv- Thanks for outlining whay has helped your wife. I also have seen such protocols helping those with fibromyalgia with a few variations. (MSM and vitamin C have also been really helpful in my experience in addition to a vegan/vegetarian diet and regular yoga/water exercise and massage).