Nutrition for Polymyalgia rheumatica
Polymyalgia rheumatica is a vasculitis, an inflammatory disease of the vessels. Nutrition does not play a major role in the disease. Due to the treatment with cortisone preparations, which is often necessary over a long period of time, it can however be useful to take certain additional preparations.
Cortisone has numerous possible side effects in the context of long-term therapy. One of them is the weakening of the bone structure with the resulting development of osteoporosis. In order to be able to work against that as effectively as possible, it can be meaningful to take regularly Vitamin D and calcium preparations. These counteract the weakening of the bone structure, since they are actively involved in bone formation.
Duration of a Polymyalgia rheumatica
As mentioned above, the duration of the disease episode depends on how quickly a drug therapy with cortisone is started. Untreated, it can last for years. After starting cortisone therapy, the symptoms usually disappear within a few days.
Prognosis
The prognosis of Polymyalgia rheumatica is relatively good. In most cases, a low-dose cortisone therapy over at least one year is sufficient to get the inflammation under control. However, the therapy is then continued for another year in order to avoid a recurrence.
However, a recurrence can also occur after the disease has subsided. This can never be ruled out because the therapy does not completely eliminate the underlying inflammation, but only suppresses it. At the earliest after two years, one should try to stop the medication and observe whether the symptoms reappear and the therapy must be continued accordingly.
Polymyalgia can be treated very well with cortisone shock therapy. This means that the symptoms are prevented by a longer-term drug therapy.In many patients, the symptoms do not reappear afterwards. However, there are also relapses, i.e. a recurrence of the disease after successful treatment.
After successful treatment of the disease, a relapse, i.e. a recurrence of the symptoms, may occur in some cases. This is then called a relapse. It is not clear exactly how high the recurrence rate is. In general, many patients respond very well to cortisone therapy and do not suffer a relapse.
