Tuesday 17 May 2022 01:10 AM Are my pills causing my hands and feet to throb? DR MARTIN SCURR answers your ... trends now
For two years I’ve had burning and throbbing feet and hands but none of my doctors has an answer. What might be the cause?
Margaret Saxby, by email.
Burning sensations affecting the feet are typically due to nerve damage in the legs, known as peripheral neuropathy. Occasionally this can affect the hands and arms as well.
There are many possible causes, though typically it’s a complication of type 2 diabetes, as high blood sugar levels can lead to nerve damage.
Heavy alcohol consumption, exposure to toxins and vitamin B deficiency may also cause nerve damage.
But as you’ve had these sensations for so long, I presume your GP has excluded all of these.
Burning sensations affecting the feet are typically due to nerve damage in the legs, known as peripheral neuropathy. Occasionally this can affect the hands and arms as well. A file photo is used above
My suggestion is that it could be due to the medications you mention in your longer letter — especially high blood pressure pills.
While one of the drugs you take, ramipril, is in fact given to improve neuropathy symptoms in those with diabetes (it’s thought to help by reducing inflammation), another of your pills, hydralazine, is reported to cause numbness, tingling and flushing in some people — although why is a mystery. This, however, rarely happens with those taking a 25 mg dose as you do, more commonly affecting those taking 400 mg.
Nevertheless, it is possibly the cause of your symptoms, although it would not be a reason to discontinue the treatment.
Doxazosin, another of your blood pressure treatments, can also cause burning, itching, numbness and tingling of the extremities. Once again, this is a rare side effect.
In my view, the balance of probability is that your symptoms are due to one of these drugs or possibly a combination of the two. It could be worth discussing this with your doctor and also checking that you were screened for type 2 diabetes and vitamin B12 deficiency. I hope this helps.
I’ve been suffering with up to seven mouth ulcers at a time. They started just after I had my second Pfizer jab in April last year. I cannot see any reason for these mouth ulcers other than the jab. I have refused the booster.
Mrs D Betts, Bognor Regis.
I understand the temptation to link your Covid immunisations to the mouth ulcers that followed — however, there is no hard proof of any such link.
There were a
