Hi Nicola

So sorry to hear you are having such a rough time of it at the moment. I used to take sulphasalzine and never had any side effects apart from the one you mentioned!! It sounds like it is a virus giving you these horrible symptoms. Also being unable to sleep does not help!!
Heres hoping that you soon feel better,

Best Wishes
Sue

Hi Nicola,

Sorry things are not good with you at present - lack of sleep is so debilitating. I was on sulpha and MTX, but didn`t have any ringing in the ears. I don`t sleep particularly well as I find it hard to get my shoulders comfortable, but that`s down to our old friend the RA! My GP prescribed amitriptyline to take alongside my night-time painkillers, as it helps with nerve pain, and they actually do help. I sleep better with them than without, and there are a number of folk on the forum who take them for the same reason. I`m not sure they`d solve the ear problem, but may be worth a try.

Hope you feel better soon,

Kathleen x

hi, i was on sulph but i got a major rash,sicky etc so had to come off it, i have L/ear trouble very annoying, got scan to check bones and all clear they decided that it's one of those things that you get with yes r.a,try not to be on the phone late at night or alot of noise pm i keep the radio down anyway or the tv,i find it really makes it bad when trying to sleep if i've been in alot of noise before bedtime, you tend to listen to the ringing instead of ingnore it, i have friend who has tenits as well but not r.a. good luck

Any more news on this?

I have Meniere's Disease and have had it since around the time I had the very first symptoms of RA so figure there has to be a relationship. Anyway, if there's anything you want to know about dizziness, tinnitus, ringing, buzzing etc in the ears, balance problems or any other ear associated problem I'm yer woman.

Oftentimes a virus will affect the inner ear. To be honest, the minute you said you'd been diagnosed with a virus I suspect this. It should have gone away by now, and seeing as you've not posted I figure it has. If it hasn't you'll need dedicated antibiotics to treat the inner ear infection otherwise it'll get worse.

Notice: once you get one inner ear infection you're susceptible to them so the second you get repeat symptoms get yourself off to the dr.

ps aren't you supposed to stop MTX when unwell? That's what I was advised.

Hi I have been on sulpha for 30 years and gladly I have not had side effects like others.I have recently seen my consultant after having xrays and my position at the mo is that I have progressive deterioration and reccommended instead of four a day I take five a day.hope it helps have been offered methrotrex but to be honest I don't want the restrictions that comes with it I have friends that take it and to be honest i think it depresses people more than helps them .Thats my opinion anyway we all have a choice Xxxxxx

Sorry haven't been on the forum for a few weeks so only just picked up the replies. I've just managed 4 weeks and two days without any sickies so rather pleased with myself, albeit very tired. To be honest if I hadn't finished for 10 days holiday after Tuesday I could see me being off sick again at some point but now I'm going to relax and chill.

GP has still got me on sudafed, must be 3-4 months now, although this time I managed to get him to prescribe more than 8 days supply since I'd started having issues buying them in the chemists. Apparently although they tell you not to use for longer than so many days, GP says there is no harm. He doesn't think the problem is an infection but that I've just got a lot of catarrah in the inner ear. Still have the tinitus ringing every so often but not as bad as it was. He says there are quite a few people with the problem at the moment. I had major issues with an ear infection a couple of year's back and this is nothing like it. If I try and drop the sudafed doseage I do get a bit groggy so it's still having some effect.

Tiredness really is more of a problem these days than the ear. I'd mooted the idea with a colleague about whether I could go back full time at next contract extension (assuming it was extended again) but then forgot about it since my contract isn't up until the end of September. Then the other week our manager mentioned it, as my colleague had spoken to her, and it's been suggested rather than working my 30 hours over 5 days, I try them over 4 with Wednesday as holiday. She did suggest 9am start but I mooted 9.30, although so far I think 9.45 was the earliest I've been in and often it's around 10. Thankfully they don't seem to bothered, although manager did ask if I was very tired last week! That's an understatement even with one full day off each week. Oh well, we'll see what happens, I can manage on 30 hours money but it would be nice to try and go back full-time since I make quite a bit extra over the month that way.

Incidentally I think some of the buzzing problem I was having in July may have been caused by the reappearance of the wasps which are in the external wall. My problem is that I've never been any good telling the direction of most sound, unless it's blatently obvious, so couldn't work out at times where the buzzing was coming from unless it was very loud. I thought we'd got rid of the wasps completely but noticed a little while later that there were still some about. Prior to the attempt to get rid of them in June, you could hear the little blighters buzzing about in between the outside wall and the plaster board around the window. No wonder there was water in that wall around the socket last winter in the height of the snow, there would appear to be rather a large gap above the window which the wasps have made use of.

Interestingly I've been feeling a bit sick the day after taking MTX the last few weeks, never had the problem before. The increased sulphasalozine seems to be helping, albeit that my swollen left knee is still an issue. The Rheumy nurse thinks it's probably a weight issue and has advised me to lose some, but I'm not sure, it could be. Trouble is as I'm still on pred, albeit down to 4-5 mg per day, I'm not convinced how successful it will be. We'll see.

Nicola