Prednisone side effects?

[Suzi Q California]

.I have nephoric syndrom.

Mark, what is this?

My mom is still on about 20 mg, and will probably get a decrease to 15 mg. and day soon.
She is still experiencing the mood swings and paranoid behavior and vivid bad dreams, but just not so intense anymore.

[Brotherjim]

Prednisone ?? no question about it ,, just dont take ,, your better off not taking chances,,,give it to GOD<

[hopeandfaith]

I am thankful that I had prednisone when I was diagnosed with temporal arteritis. It is the one drug that works for this condition. The risk of blindness is a hard thing to live with. Finding a way to lower the prednisone without having a flare is becoming increasingly difficult. I am now down to 5 mg. and my sed rate is still elevated to 40. My rheumatologist is concerned with the damage the prednisone is doing...the side effects are really bad, and not just the fact that you look terrible while on this drug. I want to be off this drug so badly. I have had no mental problems while on the drug, and I think part of the reason for this is the fact that I have been on antidepressants for many years. It just evens out my emotions. I started taking it after the loss of my daughter. I will probably take it the rest of my life. I have such empathy for people who are on prednisone. Not only are the side effect horrific, but the withdrawal from the drug can be just as bad. Going up and down on the dosage level which I have had to do cannot be good for you. It is a catch 22 situation. You end up not knowing what to do. I am with Brother Jim who posted just before I posted this. Give it to God. Great advice for us all.

[BKB]

Susan Allen wrote:

My husband is a congestive heart failure patient and has been on 10 mg prednisone for gout (for around 3 months). He is being tapered off and is now down to 5 mg. He has achy muscles and is so tired he can't even take a shower. He had a dry mouth up until a few days ago (that seems to have resolved itself). His ankles are swollen and he has gained about 10 lbs. He is a little short of breath at times. He feels like he has the flu. For a week he was so nauseated he could eat nothing but soup. His arthritis doctor at the V.A. said it was all in his head and he should see mental health. He seems to be better in the morning. Does anyone have experience with this? When he first went on prednisone he was a new man -- so full of energy. Now all he can do is sit in his La-Z-Boy

I am surprised your husband is on prednisone for gout. There are other meds that would treat that condition, with less side effects. Has he tried Allopurinol? Please research it.

It seems odd that he would be given something that increases fluid retention. I was on prednisone myself and had horrible weight gain, mostly water, as a result although I was on it for a very limited period of time. It does sap your strength since it breaks down bone and muscle in the body. Your husband may be extremely sensitive to the drug. Everyone reacts differently.

Perhaps see another doctor?

[hopeandfaith]

Do you think that your body will adjust to a lower dose of prednisone in time....for instance, if you are watching your sed rate rise after lowering the dosage, do you take the chance and not raise the dosage? As a temporal arteritis patient, the sed rate is the measurement of inflammation.....I am trying desperately to get off this drug.....My sed rate is at 40 at 5 mg. I am hoping it will not go higher. The prednisone has done so much damage, and yet it is it the standard treatment of what I have. You are damned if you do and damned if you don't use prednisone. Anyone had the same experience?

[patz]

I was given a 4 mg prednisone taper two years ago and then again recently for dental surgery. Prior to the surgery, the dentist put be on clindamycin 150 mg. two days before the surgery, and a prescription to fill for the 4 mg taper to begin taking the day after surgery. The dentist gave me 800 mg pills of ibuprofen in an envelope and told me to take two of them (1600mg) every 6 hours for 24 hours...I had horrible side effects the first time I was given the 4 mg taper, but did not realize it was the prednisone as I had fallen down a flight of stairs, had a concussion, broken shoulder and had a sinus infection. This time, I realized what was happening and called my doctor, and the dentist, and went to the ER with BP of 250/140 (I have never had hypertension in my life) and the doctor and the dentist both kept saying it couldn't be the prednisone because it was such a low dose and my body would have already excreted it, yet I had horrible symptoms including the high blood pressure, insomnia from the day I began taking the prednisone, shakes, chills, a racing - almost out-of-my-body, horrible overall feeling -- drinking about 64 ounces or more of fluid every hour and peeing copious amounts and feeling terrified....in the ER and then again when I was admitted...the doctor and nurses kept telling me it was anxiety. The cardiologist put me through a complete cardiac workup and found that I had heart problems that I have never had before including: trace aortic insufficiency, mild mitral insufficiency, mild to moerate tricuspid insufficiency, and pulmonary artery pressure of 34 MMHG. The tests were taken while I was still feeling the effects of the prednisone. It is hard to describe but I "felt" that the prednisone was still in my system until about 3:oo p.m.- which was about 3 and one-half days after I had last taken one of the pills....both my doctor and dentist told me that the half-life of that dose of prednisone means it would have been completely out of my body within four hours and that none of my symptoms could have been caused by the prednisone -- but there have only been two times in my life that I have felt like this - both times when I was on the prednisone -- and now I am being told, basically, that I am crazy....that what I experienced wasn't possible. I have a Masters Degree....I am an intelligent woman....I know that bodies are unique and excrete and process drugs differently -- I know, for example, that I am very difficult to sedate prior to surgery....have been since I was a child -- not my fault...the way my body is....WHY DON'T DOCTORS UNDERSTAND THIS?? DOES A DOCTOR - OR MORE IMPORTANTLY - A PHARMACIST - EVER REPLY to these posts? I find that pharmacists seem to know more than doctors about so many things....I am so upset about this and feel that other people are being given the same drug and told that when they have symptoms that they then have to be hospitalized and have full cardiac workups -- and I won't know if these problems are long-lasting or were because my BP was still somewhat elevated at the time and I still felt all the other symptoms of the prednisone ...or if they won't show up when the cardiologist repeats the tests in December (and, in the meantime he has put me on Atenolol 25 mg - which, if I don't need he will have to taper me from as stopping it suddenly can cause cardiac arrest....yes, all of this has made me anxious now)....is there any scholarly place to look up the side effects of prednisone at low doses, including the excretion time, etc.

[hopeandfaith]

Patz....you certainly have my sympathy. Doctors do not tell their patients about the side effects of taking prednisone....you find out yourself. My doctor did not mention th side effects of lowering the dosage either. I went into a fatigue so bad, I stayed in bed for four or five days. Also, chills, then sweating, swelling in my legs....The highest dosage I have been on is 30 mg. I have been on prednisone for a year and a half for temporal arteritis. I am now at 5 mg. and hoping to get off this drug completely in the next two months. I am slowly lowering the dosage in an attempt to not have a flare with temporal arteritis. Unfortunately, you have to educate yourself. I went online and researched my illness as well as the effects of prednisone. I have run across blogs that people refer to having terrible symptoms on low dosages, something you do not hear often. I suggest you follow the evidence.....from people on the internet who are on prednisone and have a story to tell. Good luck.

[steverow50]

I was on a Methylprenisolone pulse of 1000mg for three days then straight onto 10mg prednisone the very next day...it's been nearly 4 weeks now on 10mg and i'm having shakes and drop in body temperature 35.2, dry mouth, extremly weak legs (very wobbly) blood pressure and pulse are great 117/68 pulse 86...could this be addrenal insufficiency??

[maritza]

rebekah wrote:

hi all, i was looking for info. on how to speed up weight loss from pred. on google adn found this, i felt compelled to tell u all my story. no offense but many of u are lucky to only have to use it a short time. anyway, here goes. i'm 36 years old have been on it for 28 years, since age 7 for jra, stills's disease, a rare form of j.r.a that affects only about 10% of kids' diagnosed. it also affects my eyes which is even more rare why i was put on it originally, to prevent blindness. anway, in 2001 i went through menopause to surgery fromm ovary destruction to long term use of pred. though i only used 10 mg. every other day until this time. since then my illness has flared up/worsened about 4 mos. ago i had flares so bad i was literally screaming in pain 24 hours day for weeks adn my eyes flared so bad i couldn't see how many fingers the eye doc. was holding up so i was put on 15 mg. day by him then 15 more by my rhuemy. for a total of 30 day for about 1 mo. i've been lowering since then to try to get back to my normal 5 day. but am hurting more in body the very cold weather here, indiana, doesn't help, i'm also only 4'10" tall, weighed aoround 95-108 most life, i've gone up to 130 past few months and am very uncomfortable adn my doc. is getting onto me to lose it but it is very hard, i can't exercise as well do to the increased pain too. i'm become very self-conscious of my very poofed up face/stomache,can anyone out there help me with ideas to speed up the weight loss? i've even considered these pills u see on t.v. i will never get completely off the pred. to being on so long, it damages your adrenal glands so the body can't produce on its' own. thanks for any help availble and feel free to email me at my personal email at [e-mail], i'm not sure i will be able to find this forum agian, as said, i came acros it by accident. take care all, beck

Dear Rebeka
Believe me, I know how you feel, I have a very rare disease as well and I have been on pred for about 20 yrs now The only thing that has ever worked for me and IT DOES WORK it's the gluten free diet not only for the first time ever I was able to lose 15 lbs but I went in almost complete remission It's not the absence of gluten itself, at least not in my case,(gluten could be in some cases, if not a cause, a trigger) it's the fact that by sticking to the gluten diet you avoid a lot of carbs and, most importantly, all junk food! and is not a s limiting as it might appear In factr it's one of the easisest diet I have ever followed pls give it a try you will not regret it Also aovid salt and drink plenty of water I'll probably won't come back to this site,
best of luck
maritza

[BKB]

patz wrote:

I was given a 4 mg prednisone taper two years ago and then again recently for dental surgery. Prior to the surgery, the dentist put be on clindamycin 150 mg. two days before the surgery, and a prescription to fill for the 4 mg taper to begin taking the day after surgery. The dentist gave me 800 mg pills of ibuprofen in an envelope and told me to take two of them (1600mg) every 6 hours for 24 hours...I had horrible side effects the first time I was given the 4 mg taper, but did not realize it was the prednisone

I think you must be an exception. Some people are simply hypersensitive, and only you can tell if something affets you in a way that is impossible according to doctors and other experts. For instance, I am hypersensitive to fish oil- which is impossible, since i am not allergic to fish at all, but yet I react with fish oil capsules in all forms. Perhaps you should tryBromelain, a pineapple enzyme that acts much in the same way as prednisone, in that it is highly anti inflammatory, but has none of the bad side effects. Do your own research on it. I personallyfind it very helpful. But not everyone is the same.

Sorry you had to go through all that.

[BKB]

maritza wrote:

<quoted text>
Dear Rebeka
Believe me, I know how you feel, I have a very rare disease as well and I have been on pred for about 20 yrs now The only thing that has ever worked for me and IT DOES WORK it's the gluten free diet not only for the first time ever I was able to lose 15 lbs but I went in almost complete remission It's not the absence of gluten itself, at least not in my case,(gluten could be in some cases, if not a cause, a trigger) it's the fact that by sticking to the gluten diet you avoid a lot of carbs and, most importantly, all junk food! and is not a s limiting as it might appear In factr it's one of the easisest diet I have ever followed pls give it a try you will not regret it Also aovid salt and drink plenty of water I'll probably won't come back to this site,
best of luck
maritza

Maritza you are right on. I was on Prednisone for about 4 months at about 20-140 mg perday over a period. I tapered off over a week, which worked for me. However. Coming out of this I had a weight gain of 16 lbs. Hard to say how much of that was water, maybe 30%, but a lot was definitely fat. Tryingto lose this and get the body back can seem daunting, and it was. Over a few weeks I didn't eat too much and excercised, and not much happened. Not until I stopped eating sugar and grains, i.e anything with wheat, too much starch like potatoes, no bread pasta rice, lilited amount of fruit lots of protein in the form of meat, chicken fish or eggwhites, and loads of vegetables. I have an apple and a couple of eggwhitesin the morning, or steak and tomatoes. cabbage to snack on during the day etc. So far inthe last 2 weeks I have lost 8 lbs effoprtkessly. I am doing some homeworkouts without weights for about 15 minutes per day. Interval training, i.e skip jumps or similar 30 sec on /30 seconds off will do it for you!

I think prednisone messes with the metabolic rate.
Possible also makes you hypersensitive to insulin spikes with ensuing weight gain/fat storage (and therefore water retention)
although this is just what I think.

I was in great shape before prednisone. And then I felt muscles zapping and I think the swelling of the knees etc was the worst, it made it hard to do stuff, even go for walks. But this diet works!

[Suzi Q California]

My Mom (82) has Temporal Arteritis that was diagnosed two months ago.
She started on 60 mg. with horrendous side effects....Swelling hallucinations, depression, restlessness, psychotic episodes, bad dreams, etc.
There were times that she had hallucinations so bad that she thought that she was dying in a fire on an airplane. She would scream for several minutes,several times a day.
Finally they decreased the dosage to 40mg, and still the side effects were bad. She thought someone was "pulling" her to hell.
Now she is on the como of 20 mg of Prednisone a day with Methotrexate once a week. her sed rate increased from 5 to 108 when we decreased the Prednisone to 20 mg. With the Methotrexate + Prednisone combo, her sed rate is 82 at this time.
Still not too good, but we are hoping that the combination will take a bit more time to take effect and her sed rate will continue to decrease.

At least she is not having violent psychotic episodes anymore. She is mentally more"herself" nw, but still has a long way to go.

[rocky muskegon MI]

marla wrote:

i took prednisone four five days straight (6) a day of 10mg. the sixth day as i beagn to taper off, my blood pressure a long with sleepless nights spiraled out of control. my doctor said just don't take anymore. here it is three days later and i am having severe muscle aches in my throat, shoulders, shoulder blades, neck. has anyone else experienced this after stopping?

i feeling exactly the same way right now as i write.?????????

[hopeandfaith]

rocky muskegon MI wrote:

<quoted text> i feeling exactly the same way right now as i write.?????????

I have a great Doctor who started me on prednisone for Temporal Artertisi which probably saved my eyesight. Prednisone has horrible side effects, and you are to lower the dosage slowly...even then, you will have withdrawal symptoms...something my Dr. neglected to tell me. I felt like I had hit the wall..my fatigue was so bad. Shaking....aching all over...Hang in there and get off this drug if you can.