Have any of you ever heard of this? For the past month my mother has experienced pain and swelling in her legs. This is unusual for her because she has no health problem, no weight problem, doesn't drink/smoke, exercizes everyday and eats really well. She is full Korean so doesn't even eat the normal american junk foods full of salt and fat. She is 51 years old and we have no family history of anything like this.
It has me so worried because this is a woman who wakes at 5am to go to work, comes home and walks a mile just to "relax." And now she is complaining of leg pain, tiredness, and this swelling. So I did a search on the net for "idiopathic edema" and I did find some stuff. Basically that this can be common in women. It mentioned kidney problems, diabetes, etc. But she recently had some blood work, kidney function looked fine, blood sugar was fine. The doctors are just brushing her off, sending her home with vicodin and hydrochlorothiazide. She hasn't taken any of it, and when I read about the idiopathic edema on the net it even said water pills are not going to work anyway because aldosterone is usually high in these patients.
My mother is not knowledgable about medical stuff. She keeps calling me up and asking me what should she ask the doctor. I have no idea! I'm only a nursing student, I don't have too much experience with seeing a lot of stuff. The doctors are sending her back for glucose testing today (so frustrating, since her blood sugar was fine last week!) and I told her to sit there and insist they do tests, do something! not just send her home with vicodin.
Have any of you ever seen this? heard of it? Experienced something?
