Immune system reaction-Granuloma Annulare?

[Linann]

my 9 yr old daughter had what i thought was warts and ringworm,but we went to derm and she said she had granuloma annulare,which look like warts and ringworm,she said no one knows what causes it but could be an immune system reaction,we got steriod cream for it,she says could be a yr to go away,stinks cANYONE KNOW about this?thanks

[jaylia]

Hi everyone. I was glad to see some other people asking about granuloma annulare as well. It is an autoimmune condition and an immune response to something...but unknown what. I have celiacs and also have the granuloma annulare. I first noticed 1 spot a year ago and now have 3-4 which have all continued to grow. I am a student at naturopathic medical school and am slowly but surely trying to identify why my body is creating this reaction (to what). In naturopathic (rather than conventional/allopathic) philosophy, the idea is to get to the root cause...and not just say 'its an immune response to something and we don't know why and we could treat it with corticosteroids or leave it be'. Treating it with a corticosteroid will only suppress the symptom and, like another person posted, not treat the cause. The skin is one of your body's last ways to try to tell you something underlying is going on, it is not simply just a skin reaction/rash...it is a sign of a deeper pathology - or as we like to say an adaptive physiology (meaning your body is adapting (creating this skin condition) to something going on underneath). The human body wants to be healthy and will adapt in whatever ways are necessary to work on more important issues within the body.
I am hoping like others to figure out why I have this skin condition as it does look like ring worm and is not pretty. mine is on my arms just above my elbows and is on the inside of my knee. I would encourage each of you with GA to continue pursuing the issue and looking for what could be the cause. It is likely very individualized - some may be reacting to food, some to an environmental factor, some to another autoimmune condition that may not yet be discovered, etc. Who knows! :) But I suggest you continue investigating within yourself and with a holistic health care provider who will look at the whole body and not just the skin. I am sure each of us with celiacs understand the importance of that! :) In my opinion, I also personally would not recommend doing a corticosteroid treatment because as I said this can suppress the symptom only - which then causes your body to create a bigger response (same or different) instead. I will post more as I hopefully learn more.
But...hang in there! I'm glad there are some of us in this search and mystery together :)

[wildwitchery]

I too have Coeliacs which was diagnosed 2 years ago and I have been Gluten free since. I believe that I have had it for many years and it was never picked up and I suffered from GA for 16 years prior to diagnosis. Since going gluten free my GA had all but cleared but since May of 2009 has come back again dramatically - blood tests are all clear

Have you managed to track any other potential underlying cause down - I have said for years that your skin is the window on the operation of your body functions and whenever there is an ailment treatment with steroids etc only masks the underlying problem - which could manifest elsewhere in some way!

[Zonulin]

Apparently there are several types, as shown on this site (also a photo): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granuloma_annulare If conventional medicine is convinced it is an autoimmune reaction, I would definitely look at the diet (especially give thought to eliminating gluten, which could trigger autoimmune diseases). It looks as though the problem is more bumps than rash, or I would have immediately thought it was Dermatitis Herpetiformis, the skin's reation to gluten (often misdiagnosed/treated as eczema).

Karen

[KK_Ahiru_10]

hi, i am under 18 and i have granuloma annulare. My case started in a weird way though. I have on and off stomach problems ever since i was little and a dr. gave me an antibiotic that was too strong for me that made me throw up for 3 wks straight, but this last year has been the worst. It actually started with a sinus infection and the pediatrician gave me an antibiotic (zythromycian).I have IBS(so they say) and they said that antibiotics can cause flare ups so we have always been carefull when i need antibiotics. Anyway that antibiotic wasn't helping so we went to an ENT (ear nose and throat dr) and he put me on a stronger one (Cipro), he also said to finish out the Z pack and take the other at the same time. Well the sinus infection started to clear up but i started to have nausea and vomitting(this is was the beginning of the second week) i also developed a constant stomach pain in my abdomen around the area my naval is in. so the ENT said to stop the antibiotics (monday of the second week) and he would schedule to see me at the end of the week. the sinus infection also started to come back a couple of days after i stopped the antibiotics. on saturday we went to see him (i was still vomitting i couldnt eat or drink anything that whole week) and he sent us to the pediatrician who ended up sending us to the hospital for dehydration and some IV antibiotics since my stomach couldnt handle them (this started the 3rd week). when i was released i think tuesday the sinus infection was gone but i still had that constant pain around my naval. the next week (week 4) i attempted to go back to school but the pain was horrible and i started to have diarreah. we went back to the pediatrician and she said that there was really nothing she could do except test me for C deficil and H pylori and give me some breathing treatments (for i had a horrible cough and stuff in my chest). By that saturday the granuloma annulare appeared but it looked like a bite at first. Week 5: the test came back positive for H pylori so they gave me a prev pack (which consisted of two antibiotics and a prevacid and u took 4 pills twice a day). well that made me nauseas for the whole day (still having pain) and i couldnt keep anything down. the "bite" started to spread and turn into several tiny bumps. we go to the pediatric gastro dr the next day and he said stop the prev pac i want to make sure thats what it is before we make her take the prev pack (blood work for H Pylori can be unreliable). we asked him what he thought the thing on my hand was and he said it was a viral sore like you get on your lips. so the next day they do a endoscope and colonoscopy, i also had to be admitted early because i got dehydrated again from doing the prep stuff. also they took blood work and it showed that my liver enzymes were elevated like one was 200 something and the other was 300 something i think but they did another test (i think to make sure the blood would quoagulate) and it came back ok and they proceeded to do the "oscopies". after the tests they admitted me and ran more tests like a liver scan and a HADA scan and they came back normal with a little fat in the liver (not uncommon for someone my age). the scopes also just showed the IBS. I was released (still having pain around my naval). week 6: I tried to go back to school yet again. i either went late or left early. also it got to where it was hard to go to the bathroom and have a bowel movement (yet the stool was soft). the bumps on the back of my hand started to form a circle and a ring and was raised and looked like ring worm. we went to the dermatologist that friday and he told us it was granuloma annulare because of the way it started out and the way it looked didnt look completely like ring worm so he gave me topicort and an anti fungal cream he said if it looked worse to use the fungal cream cause then its a fungus. also this day the ped. gastro dr told us he couldnt do anything else for us so we went to a new dr the next week. week 7: we went to an adult gastro dr who would take someone under 18. he said that this didnt sound like IBS cause IBS wouldnt wake you up in the middle of the night (i forgot to mention that the pain was so bad that it would wake me durring sound sleep). So he said first we would check for endometriosis (since it was common for my age and gender) then we would do other tests to check the small intestines. i also noticed that whenever my pain levels changed so did the look of the GA like the color and shape which was weird. i didnt change to the fungal cream because it looked better in some ways (it wasnt a ring, just a red spot and it wasnt raised any more) but it in other ways it wasnt (like the size and way it looked) week 8: we did the lapriscope to check for endometriosis and everything dealing with THAT was fine but the GYN noticed that i had backed up stool near my rectum plus my small intestines was pale and and swolen and the edge of my liver was pale (i forgot we also checked the liver enzymes again and one of the enzymes was still slightly elevated). [i need to stop a minute and explain my pain, on a scale of 1-10 i have a constant pain of a 2 then it will flucuate to a 5 6 and 7, then when its really bad 8 and 9 it is also a cramping feeling] week 9: they did a CT scan and it showed nothing. i became frustrated that they couldnt find anything cause i was sick of not being able to do stuff and go to school and such. also this week the dermatologist said to stop using the steroid cream for 2 weeks. week 10: they did a small bowel study on me, the preliminary was that he didnt see anything but that he would analyze carefully. he said it's possible that lymphnodes could be causing pain (which when he said that we wondered if it could be linked to when i had my appendix out and it turned out to be mesenteric adenitis). but we never heard back from the dr on the final results of this test. this is the week i also started having more problems with bowels and the granuloma annulare. it got to where i couldnt tell if i was hungry it would just hurt id hear no growling or anything. whenever i had to go id have to strain so hard to do antything but i wasnt constipated it was soft stool, in fact i had been taking miralax to prevent constipation. i also wouldnt get alot out either. then the granuloma annulare started to come up with more bumps and it got bigger. the bumps are around the original spot but they haven't formed a ring or anything its just weird. then by the end of the week i was having torn up stomach but id still have to strain to get it out. i also started to come down with another sinus infection. Now we are at week 11 moday when i wrote this: ive got more sinus problems scared to take anything for it except tylenol because of my stomach, since last week my pain has stayed at a constant 5, and the granuloma annulare thing is scaring me the way it is rapidly changing. just to answer a few questions before they are asked, supposedly i have been checked for everything like celiacs disease and other things and they cant figure out what is wrong. it is frustrating for someone my age because i miss my friends and being at school and being able to go do things. i just thought maybe there might be a connection between the two (the GA and my stomach probs) and maybe it might also help to figure out whats wrong with me. I dont even know if i posted this in the right spot i just saw some people posted who had this and Celiacs disease and thought maybe this is where i should post this.