I am posting this in the hope that someone might recognise this condition which seems to have the doctors baffled.
My son for the past 5 months has had frequent "crops" of bruise type lesions on his upper arms. There is no trauma to the skin and no explanation as to why they occur. The have only occured up until recently on his upper arms and they do not go through a "normal" bruise cycle of changing colour over time. So although I describe them as a bruise I guess that isn't really appropriate. He has also been frequently "under the weather" including complaining of joint paina and tummy aches which fits with a possible diagnosis initially given of Henloch Shonlein Purpura or HSP. The paediatrician said that if the condition continues by his appointment in June (which will be 6 months) he does not think it is HSP because it does not normally last as long, it is in an unusual site (normally legs) and (fortunately) does not involve kidneys.
Of course I have "googled" the condition and I have to say none of the images I have seen look anything like the marks he gets.
His blood is fine, platelets, antibodies etc... so they have ruled out anything sinister. My GP says he is not alarmed by it because he says he is otherwise healthy. As his Mum I am so very worried because for all this time he has not been himself.
On Monday he had no marks on his arms and before going to bed had been laying on his floor sobbing that he ached. That night he had a large flare up on his upper arms and one on his chest and legs (which is new because had only been arms prior) so it seems that the aches were directly related. The GP said he could not see any inflammation of his joints (the next morning) and could not therefore clinically explain the aches.
Yes we are seeing the paediatrician again in June and he might decide to take a different course of action/diagnosis. However as I am worrying myself sick over this I just wondered if anyone could add any advice?
Many thanks in advance!
Diagnosis is NOT an exact science . Sometimes it is done by exclusion. It could well be he has an atypical case of HSP. As long as they have ruled out anything sinister that is the main thing. I can appreciate how worried you are tho. If it IS HSP what they suggested as a treatment?
Thanks, They are adopting a position of monitoring rather than treating it so far.
Although they have said give him Piriton if it itches which it does frequently at night.
I can understand how concerned you must be about your boy. Did you ever see [url]The Food Hospital [/url]on Channel 4? There have been some amazing results shown on these programmes. I'm not in any way suggesting your child has any of the problems listed - just that it is amazing to see what a difference eating the right foods can make to an illness.
One cannot second-guess what this may be, though Tashanie might be right. I'd want to know what he eats and how much (far too much deatail for a forum), so I would suggeat you see a registered [url]Nutritional Therapist[/url], especially one who specialises in children, who could go through all this with you and suggest what might be helpful to lower his inflammatory levels. It might just be a simple case of getting more vitamin C into him, but that's for the NT to decide. If there is no-one near you, ask if a consultation can be done on Skype.
I do hope he gets sorted soon.