I have many of the symptoms of cystic fibrosis…?

by Symptom Advice on April 6, 2011

then last night I found out that "geographic tongue" was one more symptom…
I am going to the asthma clinic in a month and I will ask for the sweat test then… but a month is a looong time…

If you had symptom after symptom after symptom …what would you think?

I have the cough, the infertility, the poor growth, the bowel problems, the tongue, & more…

Would you be worried if you were me?

Do you have incredibly thick mucus that is difficult to cough out?
Infertility isn't necessarily a symptom of CF, unless you're a male. Females were once thought to be infertile if they had CF, but that's not the case. (There are 3 women with CF pregnant in my clinic right now)
I haven't seen any CF'ers with the geographic tongue.
Do your stools smell incredibly foul? Are they greasy?
Is your BMI less than 22?
If I had symptom after symptom, I'd stop reading about it, it just freaks me out. :-)

No. CF is usually diagnosed at birth and evident right away.
Growth and infertility could be a hormonal problem. Bowel, tongue, cough ect could be a simple virus.

Geographic tongue (benign migratory glossitis) is usually considered a benign condition. It's actually more closely linked to psoriasis than cystic fibrosis; it can also be hormone-related. Let's look at some of your other symptoms.

At age 43, many women can be infertile. You may be entering perimenopause mayoclinic.com/health/perimen…

Mucus in bowel movements can be caused by diverticular disease mayoclinic.com/health/diverti… or irritable bowel syndrome mayoclinic.com/health/irritab…

It's difficult to tell what might be causing your coughing. Something as simple as an allergy or irritant in your home (such as pets or ordinary dust) may be responsible.

Although cystic fibrosis can appear in early teens to late twenties, it seldom appears in people in their 40's.

If you have a good general practitioner, you may want to see him/her for a simple physical exam that will include a Pap smear, a CBC, a metabolic panel, a thyroid test, and evaluation for IBS and diverticular disease. this may help you relax about what your symptoms mean.

When we reach our 40's, we sometimes have chronic health problems that we just have to live with. We can't diagnose you here and I'm certainly not saying that your symptoms don't mean anything. but if you're like me, you can read about a disease and then start experiencing the symptoms. I've been a healthcare teaching assistant for 20+ years, so I recognize the tendency!

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