Has anyone had experience they can share regarding RSD and Rheumatoid Arthritis? I have had RSD since’86, primarily in my left leg, but it started to spread to the right one about 2001.

Early in 2004 I began getting a lot of pain in my fingers, wrists, and back of the hands. After stumbling around to a few different Orthopedics and Rheumatologists, I finally found a young woman last year who is really on the ball and not afraid of digging in a little. She found I have wide systemic Rheumatoid Arthritis and has started me on a cocktail of drugs to target the RA, instead of just more pain pills to mask the symptoms.

Even with all of that, I am in terrible agony much of the time. I do computer work and some days after about three hours, I am totally unable to use my right hand. I have had shoulder pain so severe that I can’t lift my arm more than about three inches. This is while being on both Oxycodone and Percocet.

At my last visit, she asked if I could distinguish the RA pain from the RSD pain. The pain I describe in my hands and shoulders doesn’t seem to match the severity of the RA. The two areas (leg and hand/arms) do seem different, but it got me thinking: Even though the two conditions are not related, one main symptom of both is severe pain. Is it possible that the RA pain is being blown up by the RSD? Does anyone else have this combination?

Thanks to all…

Mike