Posts from — March 2010

Is it hard to diagnose Lupus in a teen with no positive labs?

There’s a strong family history and symptoms (including butterfly rash) that have lasted almost 4 months. Rheumy says he ruled out Lupus.

Answer
The problem with lupus is that it can ‘hide’ in blood tests and 10% of the blood tests can come back negative even though the person does have lupus. You need to see a rheumatologist that specifically specialises in lupus and they should look at all the symptoms you have as well as blood test results. We often test a patient again when they have more severe symptoms as the lupus may show up in blood tests at that time. For example when my lupus is fairly quiet my blood tests can come back as negative but when it is active the blood tests show lupus.

It may be that you don’t have lupus but with your family history and the butterfly rash, which is much more rare than people think, I would be getting a second opinion.

We have a lupus nurse online that you may wish to ask questions of, she has over 20 years experience and her own daughter has lupus: http://www.lupus.org.uk/onlinenurse.htm

Any day now (probably this week) we will have a brand new lupus information documentary on our website (www.lupus.org.uk) that is free to view, perhaps you could watch that and see if you have the symptoms being described, if you do please pursue another opinion.

Hope that helps.