Health checkup: Fibromyalgia

~Fibromyalgia is most common in women, beginning in the 30s and 40s, if not earlier. Doctors explain how to identify the symptoms and seek treatment.

Five years ago, Angela Martin of Cape Girardeau couldn't keep up in her daily life, and she didn't know why.

"I had pain all over my body, and I had migraines and fatigue. I could take a two-hour nap in the afternoon and still go to sleep at night, but I never felt rested," says Martin, now 47. At first, she figured this was a normal

part of getting older. "It really got to point where I was not productive in my life. Going to work every day was a struggle. I never wanted to do anything, even for enjoyment. I would go to the movies and just think about the pain," she says.

Martin's doctors ran several tests before concluding that she has fibromyalgia, a complicated syndrome characterized by soft-tissue pain, sleep disturbances and fatigue. Most common in women, fibromyalgia symptoms usually begin in early middle age, but may start as early as the teens or

20s. It can be tricky to diagnose, say doctors, because the symptoms mimic those of arthritis, thyroid disease, Lyme disease and depression. The causes of fibromyalgia are just as mysterious.

"Our best theory is that there is a miscommunication between the endocrine system and our nervous system," says Dr. Matthew Karshner of Southeast Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. "This results in impulses that are

sensed as pain or increased sensitivity to touch. We think that some triggers of fibromyalgia include injuries, car accidents, muscle strain and the aforementioned diseases." Emotional and environmental stressors, varying hormone levels, sleep apnea, migraines and irritable bowel syndrome are also linked to fibromyalgia.

Fibromyalgia is a diagnosis of exclusion, meaning that doctors must rule out other diseases before making a diagnosis, says Dr. Jimmy Bowen, physiatrist at Orthopaedic Associates of Southeast Missouri.

"There are no markers where we can say yes, you definitely have this or no, you don't. There's no blood test. We do a blood test to make sure you don't have other diseases that act similarly," Bowen explains. "We don't know what

causes fibromyalgia, biologically, but we know it exists and that there are treatments for it."

~READ MORE IN THE FEBRUARY ISSUE OF THE BEST YEARS, COMING IN THE FEB. 7 SOUTHEAST MISSOURIAN.