Return of my mother's knees

My mother's knees have also returned. Well, in fact they have been with us all this time, getting worse and worse. She has been getting quite fed up with them as in addition to the knees she is feeling stiff and tired and generally not able to do too much. When she has been sitting for any length of time she has great difficulties moving and the pain seems quite unbearable. She is not normally a depressed person but this has really begun to get her down. She has decided to move to a retirement flat and has sold her house (another story for another time) but has basically spent the best part of three months back and forth to her doctor trying to find out what is wrong. It seems at last that they are thinking beyond just wear and tear in her knees and she is in the middle of a series of tests and investigations so hopefully there will be some answers soon. I did some thinking about her symptoms, some searching on the Internet and together with my professional knowledge and my own experience of a rheumatic disease and think she may have polymyalgia rheumatica. When I read out the symptoms to her she could identify with several of them. The thing she was most happy about was the bit that said that polymyalgia was treatable with corticosteroids and treatment may bring almost immediate relief! I can remember how I felt after my first infusion of intravenous steroids when I was first ill. I got up the next morning and for the first time in months could lift my arms up in the shower without it hurting. The relief was amazing and I would love for my mother to get that feeling.