Same for Reactive Arthritis ... Pain was more confined to my lumbar spine but I also had bilateral hip and knee pain ---larger joints were most affected and not so much in my hands and feet and never shoulder pain. Usually a flare of uveitis happened simultaneously with flares of reactive arthritis but the inflammation inside my eye was unilateral and almost exclusively my left eye only. Both reactive arthritis and uveitis flares responded almost instantly to a high dose of Prednisone followed by a fast taper. I could taper from 100 mg to zero in a month or two for a sustained remission of both reactive arthritis and uveitis. Flares of both could happen literally overnight or sometimes within in a matter of a couple hours during the day.

The electric shocks caused by trigeminal neuralgia were only around and behind my left eye. That pain seemed to be worse when my inflammation levels were too high because prednisone worked reasonably well for it too. A neurosurgeon said some interesting things about me using Prednisone for trigeminal neuralgia. He said Prednisone was probably helping the swelling and inflammation at the source of the problem near my brain stem. I called the electric shocks to my face my high inflammation level alarm.

PMR was unilateral shoulder pain at first but quickly progressed to bilateral shoulder pain in a couple of days. The pain quickly spread all over and was generalized and bilateral. New onset shoulder pain and being unable to lift my arms was the most compelling reason why my rheumatologist diagnosed PMR. ESR and CRP were elevated and were still higher than normal on 30 mg of Prednisone. I was old enough to have PMR at 52 years of age.

Reactive arthritis with recurrent uveitis started at the age of 32. Reactive arthritis was more localized to specific areas and bilateral but never my shoulders.

Generalized stiffness and pain worse in the morning was a characteristic of both reactive arthritis and PMR. Both responded rapidly to Prednisone but after PMR was diagnosed, I couldn't taper off Prednisone for more than 12 years.