Rheumatoid Arthritis Support Group

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic, inflammatory, multisystem, autoimmune disorder. It is a disabling and painful condition which can lead to substantial loss of mobility due to pain and joint destruction. The disease is also systemic in that it often also affects many extra-articular tissues throughout the body including the skin, blood vessels, heart, lungs, and...

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If you're just getting started with this.......

katie
katie

........consider getting a shingles vaccine if you're at the appropriate age where it's recommended.  Should your treatment eventually involve a biologic, you won't be able to get the vaccine while you're taking it.  I wish someone would have told me this.  

doodlebug25
doodlebug25
Sorry Katie. I hope your post is in response to learning you could not get the immunization and not because you have shingles. It is definitely something to try to prevent.
But hopefully people will read your post and take note.
I got the shingles vaccine (even though I was not yet old enough to get it simply based on age) prior to starting Humira, as well as the pneumococcal series.
katie
katie
Thankfully, no issues with it personally. But I know several people who had horrific experiences, and I'm kicking myself for having put it off when I should have dealt with it. When you have something with as many unknowns as RA to deal with, it helps to cover as many of the knowns as you can, and I slipped up on this one.
MarleneJ
MarleneJ
I have had the shingles 4 times. Every summer, I would get a tiny bit of exposure to the sun, and break out in the same place. The first time was the worst! It was post op, my body was weak, and I didn't know what it was. I went a couple of weeks on vacation, and it took 5 months, including a month of Famvir, which is much harder on the body than Valtrex.

I was recommended to get the shingles vaccine, but the pharmacist read all the promotional material, and it basically came down to the fact that the drug company admitted they have no idea if it works, and no real way to test it. Because, if you don't get shingles after the vaccine, you might not have gotten it anyway. And it actually triggers shingles in others.

Not sure I would get it, but hopefully my shingles days are over. I haven't had an outbreak since 2012! But it is absolutely horrid. I used to sleep at night by putting successive ice packs in my arm with a rubber bad, or I couldn't sleep, the pain and itching was so bad!