Is it Migraine or Lupus?

Are all those symptoms you’re having a result of migraine?  Or could it actually be lupus?

Lupus is defined by the Mayo Clinic in this way:

Lupus is a chronic inflammatory disease that occurs when your body’s immune system attacks your own tissues and organs. Inflammation caused by lupus can affect many different body systems — including your joints, skin, kidneys, blood cells, brain, heart and lungs.

There are a couple of major challenges here.  Like migraine, lupus can result in a very different variety of symptoms depending on the person.  Also like migraine, lupus symptoms may come and go.

Don’t get me wrong – for a specialist, there are certain profiles that will obviously point in one direction or another.  But that’s not always the case.

Another challenge is that a high percentage of lupus patients have migraine as well, or another type of headache.  As we know, migraine can go along with a whole host of other issues, including stiffness, irritable bowel syndrome, and gastrointestinal problems.  When you’re dealing with a host of aches and pains, it can be hard to know where they’re all coming from.

In a recent report in the journal Current Neurology and Neuroscience Reports, Dr. Sean Ruland and his colleagues expressed concern that lupus treatment is often delayed because doctors seeing headaches or seizures are missing the proper diagnosis.

To make matters worse, some of the common treatments for lupus may cause neurological side effects.

Glori Davis wrote in Migraine Mystery Turns Out to be Autoimmune Disease about her struggles to get a proper diagnosis.  Struggling with migraine and other symptoms, she finally saw a rheumatologist and was diagnosed with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE).

Again, the fact that lupus patients may have migraine doesn’t mean they have only lupus and not migraine – more likely they have both, meaning that both require special treatment.

How can a patient work to get a proper diagnosis?  One of the most important things is to keep track of those strange, on-again-off-again symptoms that you have.  Don’t just assume that “you’re getting old” or “you’re stressed”.  Those kinds of answers mask the real problem.

Instead, be aware of things like:

• Pain:  Where is it?  When?  What kind of pain?  How often?
• Abdominal problems:  Stomach pain, digestive problems, nausea
• Joints:  Pain?  Stiffness?
• Skin:  Rashes?  Lesions?  Colour changes in fingers and toes?
• Fatigue?  Fever?  Feeling down or depressed?  Confusion or paranoia?  Seizures?

Many of these symptoms are common in both migraine and lupus.  Skin issues can be a tell-tale sign of lupus, as are certain types of pain.

Doctors and specialists need to be aware of the overlap of symptoms between many neurological diseases such as migraine and lupus.

If you’re a patient and you suspect lupus, you may want to see a rheumatologist.  For more information, here are some sites you can check out:

• LUPUS: The Disease with a Thousand Faces
• What are the common symptoms of lupus?
• LUPUS a disease of defective waste disposal, but why is it so difficult to diagnose?
• What Is Lupus?
• Rheumatologic diseases like lupus can initially look like neurological disorders
• Is Lupus Headache really Lupus Headache?