arava

[Guest guest]

Hi there! Hope you are feeling better! I took Arava for 3 years and it worked

wonders for me. Then put me on a loading dose and then I took once a day. It

was the first relief I had in years. I still was on a low dose of predisone but

I was like a new person. After three years I had a major flare up and the Arava

no longer worked. At that point they put me on Remicade (had a reaction to

that) and now a I take Enbrel with the Methotrexate. Nothing has worked as well

as the arava did when I first started it!

I wish you great luck with it and hope it works as well for you! Best Regards

Kim!

prvsundogg <prvsundogg@...> wrote:

Hi All,

I was being treated with methotrexate for maybe 3 months and all was going well.

In a short

time i was feeling pretty good, motion returing and pain a lot less. However,

around

Thanksgiving i developed a cold which turned to bronchitis and eventually

pneumonia. My

rheumotologist had me stop the methotrexate when i went on antibiotics and has

kept me off

till i get a xray this week to show that my lungs are clear. In the meantime my

PA and joints

started hurting again and in some cases seem worse and seem to have developed in

a knee

that had been fine before. Is there such a thing as a rebound effect when you

go off

methotrexate? In other words when you go off the medication the joints get worse

as the

immune system rushes back in to do its damage?

Also my doctor wants to switch me to Arava from the Methotrexate since he says

it doesn't

affect the lungs at all. I have heard a lot of succes with Methotrexate but

don't know anything

about Arava. Is it as effective as Methotrexate?

Thanks,

[Guest guest]

Hi Kim,

Thanks for the info and encouragement. I was hoping to find a treatment and

stick with it

but I guess I'll need to get familiar with a lot of the different treatments. I

want to go on

Enbrel but he wants to start me out on the methotrexate/arava types of treatment

first.

Thanks again,

> Hi All,

>

> I was being treated with methotrexate for maybe 3 months and all was going

well. In a

short

> time i was feeling pretty good, motion returing and pain a lot less. However,

around

> Thanksgiving i developed a cold which turned to bronchitis and eventually

pneumonia.

My

> rheumotologist had me stop the methotrexate when i went on antibiotics and has

kept

me off

> till i get a xray this week to show that my lungs are clear. In the meantime

my PA and

joints

> started hurting again and in some cases seem worse and seem to have developed

in a

knee

> that had been fine before. Is there such a thing as a rebound effect when you

go off

> methotrexate? In other words when you go off the medication the joints get

worse as

the

> immune system rushes back in to do its damage?

>

> Also my doctor wants to switch me to Arava from the Methotrexate since he says

it

doesn't

> affect the lungs at all. I have heard a lot of succes with Methotrexate but

don't know

anything

> about Arava. Is it as effective as Methotrexate?

>

> Thanks,

>

>

[Guest guest]

I took it and I do not reccomend it . I did really bad on it and have liver

damage from that and methotrexate . try something else . cathy from ma

[Guest guest]

I have been taking Arava for about 7 years now with no ill effects. It has

worked very well for me during that time although I am beginning to experience

flareups now. It is good medicine and I wish you well with it.

Walt

[Guest guest]

Dear Max,

I¹ve been on Arava now for almost 5 years and I have stopped it several

times due to the intense itching it causes. I¹ve told my doctor about this

of course, but he doesn't see it as a huge problem, but the itching can be

worse than the pain at times. Normally I can get off of it for 3 days and

still not lose any of the pain relief affects. The itching lets up in about

24 hours which is great.

Recently my doctor is trying to get me signed up for Simponi, which with

Blue Cross has been a real uphill battle. I thought he wanted me to stop

Arava in the meantime, but it turned out I didn¹t need too. After about 3-4

weeks, I was so miserable I could barely moved. At least it made me realize

it still works for me. As this disease advances for me it¹s easy to think a

current drug isn¹t working....until you stop it. I hope you don¹t have as

bad of a set back as I did. I¹m back on it now and I am going to be taking

Simponi along with it. I²m scared to death of biologics because trying

Enbrel and Humira nearly killed me. Simponi isn¹t supposed to have any

preservatives or any animal by products which the other two did So I¹m

praying I don¹t have any problems and it helps me some.

My quality of life now is as bad as it¹s ever been. For the first time I¹ve

given suicide some consideration, but I can¹t leave my family. I¹ve been in

pain management for 11 years and eventually you just wear out. I²m lucky my

children age grown though. I²m worried about Simponi though because of the

high infection rate and it¹s not recommended for people with COPD or any

type of lung disease. I have asthma, COPD and also have diabetes, which

causes infections that pop up constantly. So either way, it¹s going to be a

rough ride. Luckily, my liver has been ok, except for being fatty now due

to all the drugs I¹ve been on for ever. They want me to lower my

prednisone down since it has so many bad side effects. I¹ve been on it for

about 10 years now and at about 15 mg. I watched and took care of both of

my parents who died of emphysema, so I know the bad side effects of

prednisone. I guess it¹s about the devil you know and one you don¹t. We¹ll

see how it works out for me.

I hope your liver returns to normal and I wonder if other people have done

well on Arava for as long as I have? Good luck and let me know how you do

after you are totally off of it.

Sincerely,

Fran in Florida