positive rheumatoid factor in 10 year old daughter

Hi - I am trying to find some answers and hopefully some support. My daughter had HSP at 5 years old, which presented with the typical rash, severe joint pain and swelling and abdominal pain. This lasted about a year and then resolved. She was fortunate to never have any kidney involvement. Flash forward to about 8 years old and she starts complaining of ankle pain. I take her to the pedi, and an orthopedic. Xrays and MRI are done, MRI shows some inflammation but nothing else. She is 10 now and is complaining of pain in both ankles and both knees. She has started having trouble running and some mornings limps upon waking up. I think her walk has changed as she seems to be compensating for the pain. I take her back to the pedi and they did bloodwork. The tests came back with her testing positive for rheumatoid factor and an elevated crp. Her crp was 86.7....I think normal is 0-5???? Now - she also was getting over a virus, had been sick with a fever the day before the bloodwork was run. Could the virus affect her crp and cause it to rise that high? She has an appointment with a pediatric rheumatologist for 11/6. Are we looking at a rheumatoid arthritis diagnosis???? My grandmother has rheumatoid arthritis, and her grandmother had it as well. Maybe the rheumatoid factor was positive because of genetics? I fear I am grasping at straws to convince myself she is ok, but no parent wants their child to be diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis at 10 years old.

Hi Dawn, I am so sorry that you and your daughter at such a tender age are going through this. I wish I had some words to help alleviate your fears regarding this but I can only say that as a Father who has RA running all through his family tree on both sides that when my daughter went through something similar all we could do was to try to be as patient as possible and let the Doctors do their best.

In our case they were very cautious about diagnosing RA because many viruses can have very similar symptoms to RA even including blood work coming back positive. They would not diagnose it as such and after about 3 months her symptoms faded and she has been doing fine ever since. I still pay careful attention to her physically of course because of fear. As a parent I know that they can get the better of me at times. Hang in there.

She had joint pain and swelling in her wrists, knees and feet and ankles along with running low grade fevers off and on for 2 months. She was lethargic and fatigued most every day. She loves to play outside and we could not get her off the couch because of the pain. This went on for months before she began to start feeling better. The joint pain was one of the last things to finally subside. Her bloodwork started coming back better but it also took months to return to normal as well.

Hang in there.

Yes she did. Her RA was neg but all others were elevated. Her SED was especially high but that is obvious with the swelling she had. I was pretty mortified to be honest because it was almost (I have positive RA factor) a mirror of what I went through when I was in my 20's prior to being properly diagnosed.
I prayed a lot and my wife and I both tried to support each other and comfort her of course. She too was really stressed over it. She had seen me go through a very bad flare for months prior to this where I could hardly walk. We tried to simply relieve her fears and concentrate on assuring her and that helped.

It's no good to second guess yourself over it. Many kids go through growth pains and complain of joint aches. It is a part of life.

I have found that X-rays seldom show any issues at least in my experience. I have a limp most of the time and my X-rays all come back normal but in an MRI things look a whole lot different.

It is good that you took a stand with your Doctor. :)