The trouble that I have with my rheumatologist is that he never seems willing to prescribe me anything other than NSAIDS. How do you go about getting your rheumatologist to agree to the biologics?
Jroc has given you the criteria list for NZ, so I guess the way to go about getting the rheumatologist to agree is to work your way through all the eligibility criteria and stages. If you don't have the physical evidence there yet, then it will be a no go right now, but what I would do is to go back to rheumie, say your treatment isn't working and accept what he offers. If that works, great. If it doesn't, give it three months and go back and ask for something else. By the time you have worked through several different things he will be starting to think about biologics and at an appropriate point medically you will be offered them. Different countries have different hoops to jump through, but its not easy anywhere just to decide yourself what you want to take and actually get a doctor to prescribe it - you have to wait until they consider it appropriate.
The big thing though is to get some treatment that works for you, and you will get that if you work with your rheumie, give what he suggests a good try, and feed back regularly to him how it actually affects you - good or bad.
