reactive arthritis -salmonella poisioning

Hello @kivagood101, Welcome to Connect. So sorry to hear you contracted reactive arthritis from salmonella poisoning. @rgg, @jcg, and @dadcue have mentioned having reactive arthritis and may have some information to share. Here's a link to other member comments on reactive arthritis that might be helpful to scan through while you are waiting for members to respond.

You mentioned trying to do medical research on the condition. I found this article and quite a few others using Google Scholar - https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C24&as_ylo=2024&q=reiter%27s+syndrome+arthritis&btnG=.

-- A novel approach with tofacitinib for the management of keratoderma blennorrhagicum in reactive arthritis: a case report: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/immunology/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2024.1399249/full

Have you thought about seeking help at a teaching hospital or major health facility like Mayo Clinic?

I don't get to meet many people with reactive arthritis on a PMR/GCA forum. There are other triggers for Reactive arthritis and chlamydia infections waere once thought to be the primary cause of reactive arthritis. Almost any sexually transmitted disease (STD) can cause it. Now the belief is almost any infection can trigger reactive arthritis. The following link explains it reasonably well.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4952977/
"Most cases are self-limiting and resolve within 4–6 months but 50% have recurrent episodes and up to 17% have chronic symptoms. Advise patients about safer sexual practices and good food hygiene to avoid potentially 'triggering infections' in the future."

I'm certain my reactive arthritis was not triggered by a STD. It happened after a visit to Romania in the early 1990's. The food sanitation wasn't very good in those orphanages in Romania back then.

The above quote is true. At first reactive arthritis did resolve for about 5 years ... then it started recurring ... and then it was chronic. Reactive arthritis doesn't prevent someone from having PMR when they are old enough to have PMR.

Were you ever tested for HLA-B27? There are many syndromes related to being HLA-B27 positive.
https://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1201027-overview

Keratoderma blennorrhagicum was present when I was diagnosed with reactive arthritis. Fortunately those lesions didn't get much worse over time. I still have those lesions on my feet but nobody is certain what they are anymore. I only know what the doctor called the lesions when I was diagnosed with reactive arthritis more than 30 years ago.

Most of the time I can't remember the name for those lesions. Sometimes I think if I could only get rid of those lesions then I might be cured.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/keratoderma-blennorrhagicum

I was contaminated by salmonella poining recently. Tested, confirmed. 7 day course antibiotics. 5 weeks later, serious joint pain among other joint pain. Being tested now fo that genetic marker now. Primarily jewish genetic gene. Not getting mych supportbor treatment.

It was a long time ago when I was diagnosed with reactive arthritis. I remember the back pain during the night that made me afraid to fall asleep. Suddenly the bedroom would be converted to a torture chamber.

The weird thing was how I would be perfectly fine when I was awake which was when I tried to explain to doctors what happened when I slept. I don't think anyone believed me because the recommendation was a new mattress. I don't blame anyone for not believing me because I had a hard time believing it too!

This went on for a couple of months and yes they were pushing the NSAIDs. I was told to take ibuprofen initially instead of Celebrex. Later on I was told to take Celebrex because ibuprofen was making things worse.

I wound up in the emergency room severely dehydrated and thinking I was going to die. Actually I thought I had a stroke when I noticed one pupil was "fixed and dilated." That eye was responding normally because of retching. It was my other pupil that didn't dilate that got the attention of the emergency room doctor.

He assured me that I wasn't having a stroke because I was "too coherent." The dehydration prompted questions about a gastrointestinal illness. The clincher was the inflamed red eye, I really think had it not been for my eye I could have died. The inflammation in my eye was caused by uveitis which is associated with reactive arthritis.
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-09126-6_33#:~:text=Reactive%20arthritis%2Fuveitis%20syndrome%20(also,illnesses%2C%20cervicitis%2C%20urethritis).
My being HLA-B27 positive and everything that happened before showing up in the emergency room pretty much left no doubt what happened.

I'm not Jewish but that was why Reiters syndrome was changed to Reactive Arthritis. This doctor did unethical medical experimentation during the second World War.

"The arthritis often is coupled with other characteristic symptoms; this was previously called Reiter's syndrome, Reiter's disease or Reiter's arthritis. The condition was renamed to reactive arthritis because of Hans Reiter's war crimes with the Nazi Party."
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18548976/
I should add that an ophthalmologist treated uveitis with Prednisone. The general practice doctor didn't know I had taken Prednisone for my eye and prescribed sulfasalazine. The same night, I slept the entire night without pain. At a follow-up visits with the GP doctor, I said he cured me. He was skeptical and said sulfasalazine would not have worked so quickly. He was right because I wasn't cured. Prednisone stopped all the inflammation and pain.

I appreciate the history lesson about Reiter. Most dont know.

I think most cases of reactive arthritis once cured, don't recur. I have HLA-B27. I had reactive arthritis for 1.5 years in 1989 in my right knee, left elbow, right TMJ (jaw), and left shoulder; symptoms were mostly extreme fatigue and weakness, and heat/swelling/pain in joints. I had a boyfriend that was cheating on me and gave me chlamydia. Good effect was that I got rid of him (figuratively speaking); bad was I got Reiter's (it was called that then). The rheumatologist started me on naproxen (no change), a corticosteroid (nope, just made me sleepy), and finally a few months of methotrexate. Downside of methotrexate was the nausea, upside is it subdued my immune system enough that it lost interest in attacking me.
Curiously, 15 years ago I caught H1N1 followed a few days later by some guys in a car trying to kill me on my bike-lane commute from work (as distinct from the usual dangers in cycling), and the H1N1 plus stress kicked off arthritis, this time in my hands. The rheumatologist just said we'd start with the same drug sequence, then went on about cardiac ablation that he would be having soon. So, I tried the Aleve, no change, and researched if any diet changes help. One paper suggested gluten free, so tried that. My new GI problems and arthritis disappeared in a few days. The skin rashes that I had for years took a few months to disappear. So, consider switching for a while to a FODMAP, elimination, or other antioxidant/food intolerance diet for a while and see if that helps with any symptoms. I've kept a food log for 15 years because the H1N1 also triggered celiac disease. Not easy to do, but try to minimize/control stress as much as you can. NIH papers and ResearchGate are good sites for medical research papers.

Thank you. Wow! You have been through it. The science however says remisission, not cure. Im 75 and dont have the stamina I used to. Or even what had in May. Lol.

I' m now going to rant. Please ignore or forgive!

So far I'm getting no treatment other than the Cellebrex which felt like a bad trip.

I do bieve ageism is a big factor, so add real anger to how I'm experiencing all this.

Not all "seniors" sit around waiting to die.
But get inside a rhuematoligists head, and they' bored with us.
I had a whole new life planned that was both reasomable and feasible.

[My maternal grandmom lived to 101 and my paternal grandma to 98]

The resuatant that served the food contaminated with salmonnell took away my life.

Those whose oath bound to try to help return some it back.

But there' s
an experation date on that oath.

I'm 70 and my reactive arthritis (RA) has been in remission for 35 years, so maybe not a cure but it likely won't be back before I'm done. I started with aggressive early treatment because I wanted to lessen permanent damage, and my health with RA already sucked. One has to advocate for their own health, because doctors time and knowledge is limited.