Wow!

[GregS]

Hi everyone. Wow! That's all I can say. I found and joined this forum just last month, and it has been an unbelievable resource. Not only on the "what to expect" and treatment threads, but the truly inspiring stories many have told. A big thanks to all for sharing so openly.

My problems started in the summer of 2010 when I was diagnosed with my first autoimmune disease, Ulcerate Colitis. It took a couple of years to get that to an acceptable number of trips to the boy's room.

Next, in Oct 2015, I was seeing a liver specialist about a golf ball sized mass on my liver. Long story short, he removed almost half my liver, but during the prep, he diagnosed me with autoimmune disease #2 called Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis (PSC). Basically it attacks the bile ducts with an end result of needing a liver transplant. Fortunately for me it was caught early and I still have many miles left on mine.

My latest adventure was a trip to the hospital due to strange swelling and joint pain all over (ankles, hips, wrists, knees, etc...) accompanied with a crazy high fever. They happened to xray my chest due to a chronic cough, but was discharged before they got the results due to the fever breaking. A few days later my GP called me to say they found lesions in my chest and wanted to follow up. I saw him the next day and he booked me for a CT. While there he saw my joint issues and decided to send me to a rhumy since I have other autoimmune issues. Originally, I went to see the rhumy about the joint issues, but my chronic cough and chest xray came up in the conversation. The look on her face changed so suddenly I knew alarm bells were going off. What are the chances that she happened to be one of the 50 doctors in Canada that are part of CanVasc, a Canadian network for research on vasculitides. With the results of a ANCA blood test and the CT scan, she confirmed GPA last month (June 2017). After reading so many posts on here, I'm happy to say my symptoms are limited to just the slight shortness of breath and cough. I guess the stars were aligned for an early diagnosis.

Greg