Has anyone had their voice affected by Pmr? I have read that it is.
My voice has been. It’s like I had a case of laryngitis or bronchitis. This started about 6 months ago and the steroids don’t have any effect on it.
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Yes, PMR can also be associated with Giant Cell Arteritis. This hoarseness can be a symptom of Giant cell arteritis which is a serious condition that causes inflammation of blood vessels especially in the temporalis region of the head and can lead to blindness. Treatment is steroids just like PMR. I am having this problem with my voice. I was just diagnosed with PMR. Giant cell arteritis diagnosis requires biopsy of temporal artery. I’m not doing that since treatment is same for PMR. You should talk to you doctor.
A hoarse weak voice was my very first symptom of PMR, which I developed a few weeks after being infected with Covid in October 2024. I thought it was a lingering sign of the Covid. I then develped the other classic symptoms of PMR (worst pain I have ever had). Voice returned to normal after starting Prednisone. I do not have GCA - at least not yet.
My rheumatologist told me the prednisone dosage is quite different for GCA (like double)... so you may not be covered unless they started you up around 50-60mg??
Yes it has affected my voice . Throat is not sore but my vocal cords are all over the place up and down pitches !
Actually the treatments for PMR and GCA are not the same. The biologic drug Actemra is approved to treat GCA, and the biologic drug Kevzara is approved to treat PMR in some cases. The biologic drugs allow you to taper off of prednisone faster and help prevent flares.
Yes. Like a mild sore throat and a rough voice. Can't sing anymore. Frustrating.
Yes was diagnosed in 2012 with PMR. My PMR also usually comes with chronic sore throat, hoarseness and cough. I can’t go into the upper range of my voice. The first time it happened it lasted for months. While the steroid did help the sore throat my voice took months to go back to normal. The next time it happened my voice took 3 years to recover and I believe the only reason it did recover was because I had a cyst in my lumbar spine that caused debilitating pain for which the prescribed me 60 mg of prednisone, which is more prednisone than I’ve ever needed for PMR. It was assumed that I ha d GCA with PMR due to the fact that my jaw will also ache and my scalp gets sore tender spots.
Usually I’m fine starting on 20 mg prednisone and tapering down to 5mg. But I just started into another flare about a month ago and now my voice is gone again. The steroids don’t fix it, but I’ve never been giving 60 mg for PMR like I was before my back surgery to remove a synovial cyst. I feel sure that the megadoses of steroids I was given for my back cleared up my voice. That was last summer.
Now I was almost weaned off of the Prednisone when this flareup started. After doing research I’m not sure that it is PMR with GCA causing my throat and voice issuesat all.
My research has found that Lupus and Rheumatoid arthritis can cause sore throat and hoarseness and that in fact RA is related to PMR and can be mistaken for PMR or at least PMR can lead to RA. The biologic Kevzara treats both RA and PMR because of their similarities. I also had a synovial cyst in my lumbar spine and my kidneys have scarring and decreased filtering causing CKD,
RA or Lupus can cause these things but not PMR. PMR with sore throat and voice changes can mean you also have GCA. Or maybe it’s actually RA.
I know they keep testing me for it as though they still suspect it. I had elevated white blood cell count for two years and red marrow reconversion showed in an MRI that showed the synovial cyst in my spine. These the elevated white blood cells. Kidney damage, a synovial cyst in the spine and these throat/voice issues sound more indicative of RA than of PMR with GCA. The problem is my blood work never comes out positive for RA.
Welcome @ymledford, Hoping members with similar experience can respond with what they have learned. I did see an interesting article on the Arthritis Foundation site that may offer some clues.
"No single blood test can reliably diagnose RA. Some healthy people test positive for anti-CCPs, while others who have RA have negative test results. Blood tests ..."
-- What You Need to Know About Seronegative RA: https://www.arthritis.org/diseases/more-about/what-type-of-ra-do-you-have
Hoarseness and a weak voice were the first symptoms I had before developing classic PMR a couple of weeks later. I do not ( at least currently ) have GCA. Never had the headaches or jaw pain. My ESR and CRP have always been normal. The hoarseness resolved with prednisone. Currently on Kevzara and 10 daily of prednisone. L
I may be the exception to this. About two years before PMR started, I had been having voice problems, so visited a specialist and was told I have thinning vocal cords. The problem was not constant, but when it was affecting me, sometimes I almost lost my voice completely. Since I started on prednisone for PMR 13 months ago, my voice has been much better - almost completely normal.