# Costochondritis



## largenlovely (Jul 28, 2008)

I've heard a number of other fat girls around here complain about worrisome chest pains periodically. I have also had them...at one point they were pretty bad and i was diagnosed with Costochondritis. We found that the chest pains would only happen while moving. They said it was an inflammation of the upper joints in the ribcage. They said that since it was brought on by movement, that it wasn't heart related. Of course, they also did the standard heart related tests as well. There are two specific spots that the pain will radiate from..but the more common point is usually on the left side, which can make it seem super scary.

I thought i'd mention it and maybe relieve another persons mind if they have similar type pains and can bring it up to their doctor..if they think this may be an issue for you (and also so you'll know that it's not necessarily heart related just because you might have chest pains)..I too wanted to ask if any of y'all have been diagnosed with this? It leaves and comes back periodically for me...just on a whim it seems sometimes.


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## BeautifulPoeticDisaster (Jul 28, 2008)

My dr didn't give me a name for it, but I complained of chest pains and he said well from tests your heart is in good condition. However you could have irritated chest bones which is common among women. So are chest bones ribs? lol I never thought of it like that before but when I imagine a skeleton, they are ribs! lol. And yes my pain was worse on the left side and sometimes it hurt so much it took my breath away.


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## largenlovely (Jul 28, 2008)

yeah i'd actually forgotten about it because it has been a while since i've had a pain...but right before i posted the initial post, i bent over to pick something up and my entire chest locked up on me and it hurt like hell. Once i was upright again, it went away and i'm sitting here all fine lol

Yes they're bones hehe...it sounds to me like he was probably talking about the same thing. Here's hoping someone will post who knows what the hell we got LOL



BigBellySSBBW said:


> My dr didn't give me a name for it, but I complained of chest pains and he said well from tests your heart is in good condition. However you could have irritated chest bones which is common among women. So are chest bones ribs? lol I never thought of it like that before but when I imagine a skeleton, they are ribs! lol. And yes my pain was worse on the left side and sometimes it hurt so much it took my breath away.


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## Miss Vickie (Jul 28, 2008)

I have had costochondritis and yes, it's very scary and yes, it feels like what you'd think a heart attack would feel like. In my case, getting it checked out led to my Sarcoidosis diagnosis, since costochondritis is a common side effect of that autoimmune disease. I've also had rib pain and have had the ribs adjusted by my chiropractor, resulting in immediate relief.


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## liz (di-va) (Jul 28, 2008)

I keep reading this as Costco-condroitis...thought it was a shopping malaise .

I think I have this or something like it...I don't relaly know, but it's happened to more than a few times. Weird to think it is (might be) Something.


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## largenlovely (Jul 28, 2008)

that's interesting......

I have multi-nodular goiters on my thyroid with hypothyroidism. Some with irregular borders that they want to watch periodically..which scares the crap out of me. It was suggested at one point that we might have an auto-immune disease (Grave's Disease). We being me and my mother. I'm not sure how they determined we didn't have it, but we don't. It was also suggested that my mom may have fibromyalgia...we're still not clear on some of her diagnosis' because she wound up having other more urgent issues. 

It's curious that all of it may be intertwined...i dunno...



Miss Vickie said:


> I have had costochondritis and yes, it's very scary and yes, it feels like what you'd think a heart attack would feel like. In my case, getting it checked out led to my Sarcoidosis diagnosis, since costochondritis is a common side effect of that autoimmune disease. I've also had rib pain and have had the ribs adjusted by my chiropractor, resulting in immediate relief.


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## Elfcat (Jul 28, 2008)

Costos are your ribs. Chondro are I think cartilage. So it would seem it's inflammation of rib cartilage.


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## Flyin Lilac (Jul 29, 2008)

THAT'S what it's called :doh: ... I've been trying for years to remember the name after seeing a newspaper article about it and realizing it matched a periodic pain I would experience. In my case, it would hurt only as I'd take a deep breath or let it out, and I'd feel the joint or bone or whatever kind of creaking as I inhaled or exhaled. Back in the 90s I had several bouts of it, a couple of them so severe that I had to try to sleep sitting up. Then nothing for years and years, until just last week I had a tiny twinge for a few days. But as always with time it straightens itself out. Crazy shit.


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## SparklingBBW (Jul 29, 2008)

I had it back when I was about 24 and going through panic attacks. If I remember correctly (my Dorland's is in a box somewhere) it's pain from inflammation of the joint where the ribs connect to the sternum, so it isn't a bone pain but a joint pain, kind of like arthritis. With my panic attacks and hyperventilating, these joints would get inflammed from my chest expanding so quickly. Obviously and unfortunately, my thinking I was having a heart attack because of the chest pain did little to alleviate my feeling of impending doom! lol I took me a few trips to the ER, urgent care, and my doc's office before someone realized that my repeated anxiety attacks had caused this. 

Anyway after a course of Motrin for a couple of weeks and psychological help for the panic attacks, I was as good as new and haven't had a problem since then. It is a scary feeling for sure, but it helped alleviate my anxiety quite a bit, once the diagnosis was made. 

Of course I can't help but add a cautionary note here that one should never assume that their chest pain is costochondritis. Get ALL chest pains checked out by a doctor and let them make the diagnosis. 

.


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## Waxwing (Jul 29, 2008)

Genarose54 said:


> I had it back when I was about 24 and going through panic attacks. If I remember correctly (my Dorland's is in a box somewhere) it's pain from inflammation of the joint where the ribs connect to the sternum, so it isn't a bone pain but a joint pain, kind of like arthritis. With my panic attacks and hyperventilating, these joints would get inflammed from my chest expanding so quickly. Obviously and unfortunately, my thinking I was having a heart attack because of the chest pain did little to alleviate my feeling of impending doom! lol I took me a few trips to the ER, urgent care, and my doc's office before someone realized that my repeated anxiety attacks had caused this.



Well damn. This explains years of chest pains. When I was having panic attacks all the time, I had more tests than I could count and though my heart was great, my chest hurt all the time.

How amazing to finally find out what this is!!

Thank you guys for this information. Wow.


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## SocialbFly (Jul 29, 2008)

when i was working adult cardiac units, we used to ask, can you point to the pain with one finger...and if they said yes, we were less likely to think it was cardiac pain...when you have cardiac pain it is a diffuse pain, generally not in the same place as a mans...mens chest pain is generally different than a womans, due to the location of the cardiac artery occlusion site...which causes different pains and symptoms in different spots...now the pain thing...well, the best thing to say though, is if it is bad enough pain to make you worry always get it checked out 

i have had Costochondritis, i got it when i popped a rib out of place pulling a heavy patient up in bed...so not fun...my chiro would pop it back into place but generally it would pop back in when i went to sleep, and it hurts like a mother til it does....

http://www.emedicinehealth.com/costochondritis/article_em.htm


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## largenlovely (Jul 29, 2008)

I believe i may have bruised my ribs once when i was younger...I literally slid across a greasy floor and fell right into one of those big huge grey hard plastic garbage cans when i was working at a fast food restaurant (I'm a Clutz lol)...I never went to a doctor, but my ribs hurt for months and i couldn't lay on my side.

The costochondritis actually didn't start happening to me until i was exposed to large amounts of mold when living in Illinois. My throat felt like it was swelling up and i was having breathing problems. i was told it was panic attacks, but that didn't make sense to me. My ex boyfriend had just bought a house and when we moved in it, i immediately started having breathing problems. We didn't know what it was...After my ex and i broke up, he later told me that he tore down the bathroom walls to remodel it and found a buttload of mold in there. So i wondered if that was what it was..because Benadryll always seemed to make me feel better. I think I also started having panic because of it...or maybe along with it. I think that i'd start having the breathing problems because of the mold and i would get scared and then go into a panic attack with it. 

After i moved out of that house i started feeling better gradually..but a couple of things have never seemed to go away..the Costochondritis being one of them. It just comes back on me periodically.


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## Miss Vickie (Jul 29, 2008)

Largenlovely, in my case it seems like it's related to inflammation, which is a usual response to breathing problems when my Sarcoidosis kicks up. I end up having trouble breathing and the pain gets worse. Once I ended up in the ER, convinced I "couldn't breathe", though my oxygen saturation was 99%, and yeah, I was having a panic attack of sorts. The combination of the pain in my ribs along with the Sarcoidosis made it so that it felt like I couldn't breathe. 


Here's a good article about it.

Just FYI, a great quick medication for costochondritis if you can tolerate it is Toradol (ketorolac). They gave me some IV in the hospital and I got almost immediate relief. It was awesome. Toradol is basically a kick ass version of Motrin that can be given IV or IM (or po but it's not as effective). It gets rid of any type of inflammatory related pain and totally ROCKS. I love it as a patient, and as a nurse it's almost always the first med I ask for when my patients are in pain after a cesarean. The downside? You can't take Motrin with it and if you have bleeding ulcers or have any other contraindication for NSAIDS, you cannot take it. But my post op patients I give it to are always up faster, heal faster, and use less narcotics which means less constipation.


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## Paul (Jul 31, 2008)

Miss Vickie said:


> Just FYI, a great quick medication for costochondritis if you can tolerate it is Toradol (ketorolac). They gave me some IV in the hospital and I got almost immediate relief. It was awesome. Toradol is basically a kick ass version of Motrin that can be given IV or IM (or po but it's not as effective). It gets rid of any type of inflammatory related pain and totally ROCKS. I love it as a patient, and as a nurse it's almost always the first med I ask for when my patients are in pain after a cesarean. The downside? You can't take Motrin with it and if you have bleeding ulcers or have any other contraindication for NSAIDS, you cannot take it. But my post op patients I give it to are always up faster, heal faster, and use less narcotics which means less constipation.



Vicki,

I would be very, very careful taking Toradol. My wife suffers from a condition similar to Costochdritis but I cannot remember what the condition is called. Basically the condition she has is related to a rib which has separated from the lining of the abdomen whcih holds the rib in place. This rib flares up on occasion. When she was first diagnosed with the rib separation she was prescribed Toradol and was on it for at least a month. Then her doctor took her off Toradol. But Toradol cannot always be stopped without side effects. Thank goodness she still had a number of tablets left when her doctor took her off Toradol. The side effects of Toradol gave her the worst headache imaginable, like a coffee withdrawal x 10. She had to reduce the dosage gradually and "wean" herself off the medication. Her doctor said this was a common side effect of Toradol. I would only take Toradol short term. If a doctor ever wanted me to use Toradol long term I would ask the doctor for an alternate medication.

Unless you want to risk getting a massive withdrawal headache from Toradol, I would not use this medication for more than a few days.


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## Miss Vickie (Jul 31, 2008)

Paul said:


> Vicki,
> 
> I would be very, very careful taking Toradol. My wife suffers from a condition similar to Costochdritis but I cannot remember what the condition is called. Basically the condition she has is related to a rib which has separated from the lining of the abdomen whcih holds the rib in place. This rib flares up on occasion. When she was first diagnosed with the rib separation she was prescribed Toradol and was on it for at least a month. Then her doctor took her off Toradol. But Toradol cannot always be stopped without side effects. Thank goodness she still had a number of tablets left when her doctor took her off Toradol. The side effects of Toradol gave her the worst headache imaginable, like a coffee withdrawal x 10. She had to reduce the dosage gradually and "wean" herself off the medication. Her doctor said this was a common side effect of Toradol. I would only take Toradol short term. If a doctor ever wanted me to use Toradol long term I would ask the doctor for an alternate medication.
> 
> Unless you want to risk getting a massive withdrawal headache from Toradol, I would not use this medication for more than a few days.



Paul, Toradol is almost never recommended, by any of the doctors I know, for long term use, particularly since it's not very effective when taken orally; you're better off, if you're not able to get IV or IM relief, taking Motrin or another NSAID. It's not safe to do so -- you're right -- because of possible complications. Worse than what you mention, however, are possible kidney problems and GI bleeds. While headaches are awful, they aren't life threatening. 

What I think it was pretty clear that I was talking about was providing immediate relief in an emergency room or post operative setting where the benefits it provides outweigh, for most people, its possible side effects. Our patients are never given it longer than 48 hours because of the potential for harm. And obviously some people shouldn't take Toradol at all -- those at risk for GI bleeds, who have questionable kidney function, and probably lots of other situations that I can't remember.. Since it's prescribed by a physician, however, after taking a patient's history into account, it's not like we can buy it by the case load at Costco and go to town. 

Any medication has the potential to do harm, and people can get rebound headaches from nearly any pain reliever. They just prescribed Maxalt for my daughter and while she's taking it for headaches, if it's taken for too long, it can cause.... headaches. Helpful.  :doh:


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## QuasimodoQT (Aug 1, 2008)

I had this years ago from a car accident. Some guy came across 3 lanes of traffic right into me, forcing me off the road. I jumped the barrier, went end over end, and hit a tree. Had my seat belt on, but the impact snapped the bolts holding the bench front seat to the floor, and I was crushed against the steering wheel.

Apparently, it "popped" my ribs off the sternum, so it didn't surprise me that everything got inflamed. It took about a year before I could breathe deeply, but had lasting effects, because while things were healing, I was breathing so shallowly. All those connectors shortened up, since they weren't being stretched, and it was 2 or 3 years before I could breathe as deeply as before.

Posting to encourage those suffering from this now to still breathe deeply, albeit cautiously, to keep things flexible once you're healed. I never had a recurrence, and went on to sing Wagner, so I'd say it's no longer an issue.


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## irish_redhead (Aug 3, 2008)

I had a bought of Coctochondritis back in 2002. I started experiencing chest pain (while at work, go figure) and ended up bawling and hyperventilating in a bathroom on the unit. My coworkers took me downstairs to the ER, and the doc diagnosed me right away. All it took was 1 thumb pressed on the right side of my sternum, and I thought he was going to have to peel me off the ceiling. They gave me a shot of Ativan, some Ibuprofen and sent me home for the night. 

About 24 hours later it returned - because I knew what was happening I didn't panic as badly, but still the inability to take a deep breath caused some panic. I ended up back at the ER (I was working on a reserve up north, hospital housing was right across the street from the hospital! Lucky me!) and had a full cardiac workup done (different doctor) - same diagnosis. More ativan, kept on the ibuprofen, and just dealt with it. I only ever had those 2 boughts of it, and it never returned. 

Incidentally, in 10 years of nursing I'd never heard of it. The following week I had 2 more patients who were diagnosed with it! 

It can be a sign of autoimmune disorders, or fibromyalgia. It's also considered a repetetive strain problem - which was likely the cause in my case. Lots of heavy lifting and upper body twisting at work caused it to flare up. Luckily, I've never had it happen since.


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## goofy girl (Aug 3, 2008)

I'm such a retard, but I have had chest pain for years and never even told my Dr because it happened so often and for so long that I figured since I had lived after years of it, it was no big deal LOL. But I did bring it up to her recently and she said that the pain I was describing was muscle pain and nothing cardiac..which I guess did bring me some relief.


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