Temporal Arteritis

[badgernurse]

Hi everyone,

My family has relied on me to be the "medical expert" in all things from a bruise to a stroke. I'm sure you can all relate that our friends and loved ones look to us for answers, reassurance, or just free medical advice about everything. I am an open heart recovery nurse and have been for many years. I try to steer people in the right direction and often send them to their doctor with a few questions to ask and all is good.

However, lately I am in a situation concerning my mom where I hardly have any answers and feel like I'm dropping the ball where I need to be helping a lot more. The problem is she was diagnosed with temporal arteritis at the beginning of the year. She has had the symptoms probably for a year starting with really bad headaches. She was put on Prednisone as is the treatment of choice but what worries me is her respiratory status. Since starting prednisone, she is increasingly dyspneic with minimal activity where she was previously extremely active and totally independent. She is 67 years old. She is on home O2 and can't walk a flight of stairs, much less go to the grocery store. This has gotten progressively worse in the past few months. She was hospitalized last month due to her sats being 79. The ruled out PE, CHF, pneumonia and did not see evidence of lung ca on CT/Xray. They sent her home with no answers and she has gone from independent, working, travelling to confined to her home and miserable.

Her sed rate is up and down so the prednisone is adjusted as well. She is seeing a pulmonologist, cardiologist, rheumatologist and they keep saying she will get better.

I have scoured the internet and found very little useful info to help me help her. Oh...and she lives about 500 miles from me. I feel useless to her when I should be her strongest advocate!

Does any of this make sense? Could the arteritis cause all the pulmonary problems this quickly and not resolve with prednisone? She does have a smoking history and likely has emphysema but I would think the prednisone would help and not cause this to worsen in such a short period of time. Any thoughts or direction would be appreciated. Thank you in advance!

[JustBeachyNurse, LPN]

I'm sorry but as per the site terms of service agreed to when signing up members can neither request nor offer medical advice for others or someone they know. You need to discuss your concerns with your mother's medical team (with her permission as per HIPPA). I'm sorry that you are so far away and understand that you just want to help in this difficult time.