subject: Fibromyalgia - What Is Fibromyalgia? [print this page] Are you feeling sleepy? Is your body aching specially all over the muscles? If the answers are yes, amidst all possibilities chances are there that you may have got fibromyalgia. Before the question strikes your mind that what is fibromyalgia, it can be told that this is not classified as a disease in the medical terminology. Rather it has been described as an irritation in the medical terminology which can range between sleeping disorder to acute muscle pains.
Causes of Fibromyalgia
If you want to know what is fibromyalgia, you must know that this is necessarily a nervous system problem and there is no proper reason. Even the entire medical history is bereft of a proper explanation of Fibromyalgia and its reasons. Since the symptoms are not exclusive to Fibromyalgia, the causes of fibromyalgia can not be identified.
Symptoms of Fibromyalgia
Fibromyalgia has some very common symptoms like sleeping disorders, muscle pain and lethargy in general. But if you experience any one of these symptoms, it cannot be said that you are suffering from Fibromyalgia. There can be several other reasons that may cause these symptoms. So diagnosis of Fibromyalgia becomes different.
Diagnosis of fibromyalgia
Since the symptoms are much generalised, it is very difficult to identify that a person is suffering from Fibromyalgia. It often takes four to five years to diagnose fibromyalgia. There is no medical test to ensure that there are signs of fibromyalgia. The doctors have to understand that the patient may have developed fibromyalgia just hearing the general symptoms.
There is one recommended test that has to be performed by the doctors. If a simple press on the surface of some specific body parts hurt you a lot, chances are high that you are suffering from fibromyalgia.
Apart from the medical test, your doctor may ask you to do some blood tests. But those are to check out whether there ca be any other reason for your symptoms. So the blood count test, thyroid test are recommended. If these results come out positive, fibromyalgia can be rules out. On the contrary, these can be ruled out.
When will you see the doctor?
When you know about fibromyalgia, you must understand the basic of this illness. You may have muscle pain for other reasons. You may see a general physician for that. But when will you seek specialized opinion? Experts say, you are not suffering from fibromyalgia, if you are not having pain in at least eight joints of your body. Fibromyalgia pain is prolonged and acute.
Treatment of fibromyalgia
Fibromyalgia patients are often seen taking pain relief, sleeping pills etc. This is because fibromyalgia does not have any exclusive symptom. So treating this illness with medication actually means treating the various syndromes. But only medication is not the solution of fibromyalgia.
Since the symptoms of the disease involve physical exhaustion, exercise, acupuncture, yoga will work quite well with the treatment. It should not be treated from single point. The treatment must be multi dimensional.
