Fibromyalgia is often missed or misdiagnosed for a number of reasons. There aren’t definitive blood tests or X-ray to diagnose Fibromyalgia and it shares symptoms with many other diseases and conditions.
Diagnosing Fibromyalgia is a combination of taking the patient’s symptom history, a physical exam testing the Patient’s Trigger Points and exclusion.
Today I’m going to focus on the exclusion portion of diagnosing Fibromyalgia. Sometimes people are diagnosed with Fibromyalgia because their doctor failed to run the necessary tests to uncover a different, and perhaps serious condition.
If you feel terrible and are experiencing a variety of symptoms common to Fibromyalgia, you are going to go to your doctor.
After taking your history, your doctor is going to want to run some tests to begin excluding diseases.
What Diseases & Conditions Should Your Doctor Test for when Diagnosing Fibromyalgia?
The following diseases & conditions share some of the symptoms of Fibromyalgia and they should be excluded. Sometimes doctors who aren’t as familiar with Fibromyalgia fail exclude some of these serious and life threatening diseases. You have every right as a patient to ask your doctor to test you for all of the following:
Diabetes
Easily tested for with a blood test
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
There isn’t currently a blood test for this condition, however they recently discovered that CFS is caused by an autoimmune virus and I suspect there will be a blood test forthcoming. Talk to your doctor about Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
Hepititis B & C
Easily tested for with a blood test
Lyme Diseases
Doctors often overlook Lyme Disease and do not test for it. This is an oversight on their part and you should ask to be tested.
Lupus
There isn’t a definitive test for Lupus however your doctor should run a ANTI NUCLEAR ANTIBODY Test. If you have high autoimmune activity in your blood (a trait of Lupus), this test will detect it.
Multiple Sclerosis
MS is also difficult to diagnose, however they do use MRI to test for MS. While you shouldn’t run off and get an MRI just yet, talk to your doctor about Multiple Sclerosis.
Rhuematoid Arthritis
Easily tested for with a blood test
Sjogrens Autoimmune Disorder
Easily tested for with a blood test
Thyroid Disease
Most doctors only test your thyroid with a THYROID STIMULATING HORMONE Test. However, you might have a thyroid issue even if your thyroid is functioning properly – I do! Fibromyalgia Patient’s often have thyroid issues in conjunction with Fibromyalgia so running in depth tests is a must. Ask your doctor to run the following tests:
FREE THYROXINE LEVELS
T3 and T4
ANTI THRYOGLOBULIN ANTIBODY
ANTI THRYOGLOBULIN ANTIBODY
Other Blood Tests Your Doctor Should Run for a Fibromyalgia Diagnosis:
CBC: Checks your Complete Blood Count. Looking for issues such as anemia and other diseases.
COMPREHENSIVE METABOLIC PANEL: Tests your kidney, liver and overall health.
HEME PROFILE + ELECT DIFF: Checks for unusual activity in your white or red blood cells.
FOLATE: If not included in your CBC, checks your folate levels.
SEDIMENTATION RATE: Checks for inflammation in your body
SERUM PROTEIN ELECTROPHORESIS:Tests for autoimmune diseases
VITAMIN B12:Checks your B12 levels if not done in your CBC.
VITAMIN D: Checks your D levels. Vitamin D is the Sunshine Vitamin. Ask your doctor to run the Vitamin D test that checks both your D3 and D2 levels. This is a hot topic because scientists are re-evaluating what they previous believes. Research is showing that while your combined D level is within normal range if your D3 and D2 levels might be individually low and this could be an issue. (My D2 is zero).