As asked I will document to the best of my ability my Cimzia journey. A little background. I am not currently in a flare but the amount of scar tissue in my rectum keeps causing it to close up. I will probably need surgery sometime in the near future to get rid of the five inches or so of scar tissue but hopefully the Cimzia works to keep the scar tissue from growing again or at least that is the hope.
Background on Cimzia:
It is a drug like Infliximab and Humira in that it uses a protein to target the inflammation. They use two injections, one in each leg(although they said I could get it in my stomach but they like the leg best), and they inject into the fat layer right under the skin. The needle barely hurts. The drug itself is a rather thick liquid being more like a syrup then a liquid and this results in a rather slow injection rate being around 10 seconds a needle. The Cimzia has a slight burn to it as you feel it heat up your leg gradually as the drug makes its way around your leg and into your body. It is a relatively quick treatment but it takes 20 to 40 minutes for them to mix it up so you have to call ahead to get the treatment and it is rather expensive, being around $5000 US a treatment. I think I have more to add but I'm sleepy so I'll write more later. If I forget then could someone let me know. Thanks
I started my Cimzia on 1/8/09. So far I haven't seen much improvement since I had the dilation that day as well I can't tell how well it is working. My stool is solid but soft which it lacked before and it is much larger than it was before the dilation. I get periods of time where I get my color back and other times where I lack color.
It seems to take a few injections to start taking full effect. I go back on the 22nd for my next two shots.
Background on Cimzia:
It is a drug like Infliximab and Humira in that it uses a protein to target the inflammation. They use two injections, one in each leg(although they said I could get it in my stomach but they like the leg best), and they inject into the fat layer right under the skin. The needle barely hurts. The drug itself is a rather thick liquid being more like a syrup then a liquid and this results in a rather slow injection rate being around 10 seconds a needle. The Cimzia has a slight burn to it as you feel it heat up your leg gradually as the drug makes its way around your leg and into your body. It is a relatively quick treatment but it takes 20 to 40 minutes for them to mix it up so you have to call ahead to get the treatment and it is rather expensive, being around $5000 US a treatment. I think I have more to add but I'm sleepy so I'll write more later. If I forget then could someone let me know. Thanks
I started my Cimzia on 1/8/09. So far I haven't seen much improvement since I had the dilation that day as well I can't tell how well it is working. My stool is solid but soft which it lacked before and it is much larger than it was before the dilation. I get periods of time where I get my color back and other times where I lack color.
It seems to take a few injections to start taking full effect. I go back on the 22nd for my next two shots.