OT - prednisone side effects

[travismcgee]

Hello all, I have been taking prednisone for just under two months for polymyalgia rheumatica. Started at 15mg/day for 3 weeks then went to 12.5mg/day
for 2 weeks then up to 20mg/day for a week and then back to my current dose of 15mg/day [10mg in the morning, 5mg late afternoon].

I am still trying to get a feel for what changes I have noticed in my overall health that may be due to the drug. The three things that I have become most aware of are: 1)I have very bad muscle cramping in my calves at night during or just prior to sleeping, 2) I pee a lot more and 3) my heart rate in the late afternoon is about 10 - 20 bpm faster than before I started taking prednisone when measured at the same time of day. I usually check my bp a couple of times/day.

So my question is have others taken prednisone and if so what side effects did you experience?

Thanks in advance to those who kindly take the time to respond.


Cheers



Travis

[cflame1]

My breathing gets worse instead of better on prednisone... so I won't take it anymore.

[Marietjie]

At your left hand side in the 'SEARCH' column, type in prednisone side effects and read what members of CpapTalk wrote about the side effects.

[Julie]

Please ask your MD about them, especially the peeing so much.

[kteague]

I took Prednisone for 5 or 6 months for interstitial lung disease. Experienced hot flashes and weight gain, and most important, increased eye pressures. Didn't know I had undiagnosed glaucoma, and my pressures were in the 40s, which is sight threatening. Can't take Prednisone for that reason. In years past I had used the 2-week course of it a couple times to get a grip on my lung inflammation, and only experienced the ravenous hunger. Maybe at a low dose your side effects will be minimal.

[kebsa]

Prednisolone is a very useful drug, a very potent anti inflammatory drug but it also has a very long list of potential side effects- i can say i have heard about increased pulse rate as a side effect or leg cramps- as for peeing more, this is a potential effect but from indirect effects- prednisolone can lead to increased blood sugar levels (eg drug induced diabetes) and part of the bodies way of trying to lower an abnormally high blood glucose level is to make you pee more, not sure if you have a history of diabetes or not, you would have to be pretty unlucky to ned up with blood sugar problems from short term use of prednisolone at the doses you describe- unless you already had diabetes then it would make more sense- it is one i would be telling your Doctor about though to be safe.

the more commone side effects from predinisolone are weight gain and with long term use there is a characteristic pattern of weight gain- what they refer to as "moon face" a very rounded facial appearance, fullness in the cheeks, fat accumulation in the area at the base of the neck between the shoulder (flatteringly referred to as the Buffallo hump!) fat accumulation around the stomach- not things you would see after a couple of weeks use though. a lot of people find that they develop a voracious appetite- i know that even short term use for me means that i could just about eat a horse and can back for seconds!, it can lead to mood changes, again this is one i am very sensitive too- when my MS flares up i am put on 1000mg of methyprednisolone intravenously for 5 days and while it does usually improve some of the MS symptoms quite quickly i still cringe at the thought because i get major mood problems- i become very depressed and it is an irrational sort of feeling- for no apparent reason at all i will just start crying at the drop of a hat! but 1000mg is a massive dose!. other long term effects can be osteoporosis, increased risk of fractures, bruising easily, long term use causes skin changes- a sort of papery effect to skin on the back of the hands for example and if the hand is knocked, bleeding under the skin or skin tearing can occur easily. with long term use they will usually keep a watch on you eyes as there can be changes there too (i can't remember if it is cataract formation or glaucoma, its one or the other). long term, high dose also can be immunosuppresant to a degree so they usually advise that patients have flu shots and patients are more prone to a variety of infections, wounds tend to heal more slowly

if you look it up you will find a lot more than this and for this reason many people are scared of prednisolone and steroids in general (and these are different than the steroids that weight lifters have been known to misuse)- even though there are a lot of potential risks, the drugs are highly effective treatments for many conditions- they can literally be life savers! for conditions like polymyalgia rheumatica that you mention and MS as in my case- they are not a miracle cure but they certainly are very important drugs to try to control flare ups of these kind of conditions- With MS for instance- they do not "cure " it and as my neuro tells me, 6 months after a relapse you can't tell if the patient was given prednisolone or not, but in the early period of a relapse they can make a real difference in getting the worst of the symptoms to settle down quicker- i hate the mood changes from the steroids, but i will put up with it - for instance, one attack paralysed my leg- i only have the one leg so this is very disabling! after a 5 day course of mega dose steroids i already had a good amount of sensation and movement back in my leg- without the treatment it could have been weeks! so i will put up with crying like a baby for no reason!

hope this has helped and not scared the C*&p out of you! most of the side effects are from continous, long term use rather than intermittent use- but do get the peeing checked out!

[DoriC]

My husband has Poly Rheum. for many years. As you know, it's more a diagnosis of elimination rather than being definitive after everything else is ruled out. He has been through many cycles of prednisone and does OK for awhile after he's tapered but after a few months the pain in his hips becomes quite disabling again. So after trial and error, the Drs decided that a maintenance dose of 5mg daily would be OK and it seems to keep his flareups in check. Occasionally he needs 10mg for a few days but not often. Of course we're not happy about it but it is keeping him going and he doesn't seem to have any side effects. Our Dr told us that our own bodies produce about 7.5mg daily. He has blood drawn every 4months and his sed rate and CRP are always elevated somewhat but are being controlled by the prednisone.

[Severeena]

I can tell you first hand what the side affects are.

One is weight gain, you eat like you are starved, Diabetes, what I call the Prednisone puff. Your face, arms, and legs swell up like a ballon.

I have refused Prednisone everytime it was mentioned to me.

I am now suffering from Type II Diabetes and I know that the Prednisone had something to do with it.

Run as fast as you can from this dug.

[travismcgee]

Thanks to all who have responded. I have an appointment this friday with my rheumatologist and will be discussing my side effects and longer term useage
of the drug in regards to benefit vs cost.

Cheers,


Travis

[kebsa]

DoriC

Your are correct that our bodies produce the equivalent to prednisolone, the adrenal hormone Cortisol is a natural form and in fact without it you have a condtition called addisons disease that used to be fatal before they were able to produce it artificially- your late President JFK had addisons from memory and that was about the time that prednisolone was produced artificially for the first time- it was hailed as a miracle drug- cortisol is one of the hormones that helps our bodies cope with a variety of natural stressors- a dose of 5mg per day would be unlikely to cause any major side effects- as with many medications it becomes a cost/benefit situation-when a person has a condtion such as COPD that flares up they will often be given an IV verson for a few days then 60mg orally for a few days while it gradully tapers down and either stops completely or as you describe a very low maintainance dose- Severe Asthma is a killer and many severe asthmatics will have an action plan that when there peak flows drop by a given level they will automatically start the cortisone meds- i do get worried when i hear people speak of prednisolone as if it were poison! comments like run for the hills! are a bit over the top - as an RN i know that i have seen patients who put there health at risk by refusing steroid medication because someone has told them horror stories OR they get it mixed up with anabolic steroids- for some medications such as certain respiratory and renal conditions, it can be a life saving drug and in most cases it is a drug that is given at slightly higher doses when a health problem is severe (such as a person having an exacerbation of COPD or even asthma) the high doses help settle the conditon and then are weaned down again after the illness has settled. I certainly understand the negative effects too- as i mentioned before, it makes me very depressed, it sends my blood sugar levels sky high and needs to be used with caution as i already have had osteoporotic fractures but the benefits of helping an MS relapse settle down and reduction of disabling symptoms means the risk/benefit equation is worth it- it just means i need to take more care of my blood sugars for a while- perhaps go on sliding scale insulin until things settle. Judiscious/cautious use of the drug can quite literally be a life saver for some- it is used in chemotherapy regiemes to treat cancers, as an immunosupressant in other conditons and a very potent form of anti inflammatory drug for many inflammatory condtions that can make life pretty darn hard with out it!

[DoriC]

Kebsa, Thanks, you took the words right out of my mouth!(LOL). I also have personal knowledge of prednisone as I have pretty severe asthma and although it's finally being controlled with the right maintenance inhaler and nasal steroids, there were times after an ER visit I needed the whole prednisone RX for 3-4wks, decreasing dosage every few days. I don't think I would have made it without that treatment, I had almost zero lung capacity at the time. The side effects of hunger,puffyface,elevated sugar,hyperactivity subsided very quickly once I came off. I'm not an advocate for this drug in any way but under proper Dr supervision it can save lives.

[Murphy]

I have had PMR for about 10 years, they start off giving you a high dose but taper you down to 5 mg and then my rhuemy told me to keep decreasing it slowly and I was down to 3mg a day very quickly and have been on that for the last 10 years, my biggest problem is weight and depending on the dr you talk to some will say it's because of the pred and others will say that at such a low dosage it doesn't affect weight. So I am not sure what the answer is but its better than not being able to move. I have been lucky and have had no other side effects, I do on occasion try to get off of pred but I make it to 2mg and I am in pain. All of the info I read on pmr says that it only lasts 2-3yrs, but unfortunately for me that has not been the case.
Good Luck
Eileen