Hi, my name's Faye, I'm 22 and from Liverpool but living in Sheffield for university.

I have had myofascial pain syndrome for the last 6 years (since I was 16) but wasn't diagnosed until last year (they thought I had a multitude of kidney problems beforehand).

I need some advice on painkillers if anyone can give me their input. I've been on varying types of codeine since I was 16. Until recently I was on 30mg dihydrocodeine and have been for about 5 years. When I came to uni the new doctor swapped me to 120mg slow release dihydrocodeine, but it really isn't working for me. I'm in severe pain constantly and am missing uni because I'm not able to stand up straight or walk properly a lot of days.

In the past doctors have tried me with tramadol but it made me really sick and sleepy. Also tried various anti inflammatories like strong ibuprofen and diclofenac but these didn't make a difference to my pain. As well as these I've tried various other options like capsaicin cream, lidocaine patches, pregabalin (lyrica) and acupuncture. I had trigger point injections last September with anaesthetic and steroids, which helped loads, but the pain came back after about 6 months and doctors say they don't like to give these much more often than every 2-3 years due to risk of nerve damage.

I need to go back and speak to the doctor about changing my medication again, but at this point I can only think to ask him to swap me back to the 30mg dihydrocodeine. I know you build up a tolerance really quickly, so after 5 or 6 years the tablets probably aren't very effective, but I'm not sure what else to suggest.

Does anyone have any suggestions of medications I can speak with my doctor about? Or does anyone else also suffer with MPS and have any suggestions of what I can do to help the pain?

Appreciate everyone's advice, sorry for such a long post!

Faye

Welcome fairyfaye06.

I wonder if some of the medications and treatments would be similar to fibromyalgia treatments?
Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue
http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/forum12.html

Medications & Treatments forum -
http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/forum72.html

Chronic Pain forum
Whatever the cause, support for managing long term or intractable pain.
http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/forum10.html