Rule out parvovirus as cause of FM

[CJ]

Howdy--

since my signs and symptoms of FM began directly after a bout with the human parvovirus (aka Fifth Disease), I began doing some research and ran across some papers written by a wonderful doctor named Lawrence Brent. He is the head of rheumatology/immunology at the Albert Einstein Med Center in Philadelphia, PA. You can do a search for his research on PubMed.

He found some folks who had what looked like FM--turned out they had had a run-in with the parvo virus and it stayed in their system for much longer than normal. Their bodies had not been able to completely get rid of it.

You can have your IgG and IgM tested which will show if you have been exposed to the virus, but Dr. Brent found the virus could be "hiding" and they did not find the virus until a PCR (polymerase chain reaction) test was done on the plasma, not the serum (please verify this as I am also partially brain dead). There is an actual cure--it's IV immunoglobulin therapy. Within a few months there was no more virus found and these folks were AMAZINGLY better. I would have like to have been one of those people, but alas, I was not.

If you are interested, try to get your local doc to do this test, and if the PCR is positive, give Dr. Brent a call (or have your doc call him). I didn't need a referral to see him, but it took about 3-4 months to get in. He is the nicest doctor I have ever met and very caring. I originally called and left a message asking about docs close by to me who were up on this research (I live 4 hours away from Philly) and he called me back the same day! How impressive is that? I wound up seeing him anyway and he was very thorough and seemed to be genuinely interested in my situation. I noticed that he was just as kind and caring with all the other patients, too. Pretty impressive for a department head who's collaborated on major research with big wigs from other countries. If you are interested, here is his info...

Dr. Lawrence Brent
Albert Einstein Medical Center
5501 Old York Road
Philadelphia, PA 19141
215-456-7380

Feel free to e-mail me for more info at siege571@cs.com
Hang in there.