The disease of misunderstood pain, called fibromyalgia, is characterized by severe muscle aches, sleep disorders, chronic fatigue, digestive disturbances, anxiety, and other symptoms. It is increasingly common in the population and is also known as the disease of modern times. Although it does not have a precise cause, studies have revealed that it can be produced by an alteration in the pain modulation pathways, which interpret sensory stimuli as painful.
It is a very complex rheumatological disease, but at the same time very common among the population, with an estimated 2 to 4 percent of patients among the world population.
Fibromyalgia causes a lot of pain and tenderness throughout the body, causing "tender points", which can be located on the shoulders, neck, hips, back, legs and arms, which hurt if pressed.
Statistical tests carried out by institutions such as the American College of Rheumatology indicate that they are characteristic or more common symptoms of fibromyalgia: sleep disturbance, fatigue that does not improve with rest, confused numbness of the body in the morning, headache, tingling or cramps of arms and legs, irritable bowel, Raynaud's phenomenon and anxiety or depression.
Fibromyalgia strikes mostly women, with 80 to 90 percent of the amount making up those affected by the disease. On the other hand, the initial age for the disease is very wide, in some cases it has started in pre-adolescence, while in others in old age.
Today the confusion between lupus and fibromyalgia is a real problem. It is not alien to the reality that in medical practice there are patients who have been diagnosed and treated as lupus, when what they have is fibromyalgia. This is because both conditions commonly affect women, producing diffuse pain, fatigue and other heterogeneous symptoms (which vary, are not precise) such as joint pain, fainting or redness of the cheeks.
Antinuclear antibodies are present in both diseases (which instead of protecting, attack the cells of the body that are healthy), the difference is that lupus damages the structure of the body, affecting the skin and organs, otherwise the fibromyalgia that does not harm the structure of the body.
