Can you tell me about congestive cardiomyopathy brought on by long term pulmonary involvement? How is it treated?
Long term pulmonary involvement (fibrosis/scarring) causes failure of the right side of the heart called cor pulmonale. It is due to the lack of oxygen. You need to be on oxygen if your oxygen is low. Prednisone, chloroquine on hydroxychloroquine and methotrexate are the drugs used to treat sarcoidosis of the heart muscle. 27. In talking to several women who have sarcoidosis, I discovered some of us have severe back pain, in the muscle along the bra line and then up the middle, It is more severe at some times than others. Can you shed any light as to the cause? Back pain may be due to enlargement of the glands (hilar) in the chest, muscle spasm, arthritis in the spine involvement of the nerves supplying the torso or even osteoporosis related to prednisone. In some cases pain in the chest may be due to the involvement of the lung lining or pleura. Thus, persistent back pain requires careful evaluation.
