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Prednisone Taper

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Ulcerative Colitis
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Posted 10/16/2008 9:42 PM (GMT 0)
My husband's GI doctor is recommending that he taper prednisone by 5 mg per week, but that if he gets worse he will need to go back up to the max dose (60 mg).  This makes no sense to me -- I would think that if he has found a lower effective dose, he should just go back to that next step up.  He's already been on prednisone for over five months.  So far, he's down to 55 mg and is doing okay.  What if he gets down to 30 mg and is fine, but then the next step down starts to flare -- why couldn't he just go back up to the 30 if that's an effective dose for him?  Does anyone have any experience with this?

Thanks very much.

Posted 10/16/2008 9:52 PM (GMT 0)
Prednisone is a crazy powerful drug and lots or at least mine will also kick me back to max dose. But mine wont go over 40mg's ever for me. My pharmacy messed up once and gave me 50mg dosages and he was very upset. I wonder if there are any GI's with UC themselves.lol that's the one I want to see.haha.
Posted 10/16/2008 10:12 PM (GMT 0)
I absolutly agree with you dec38. You should always use the lowest effective dose with prednisone. Most GI's know that. Personally i would do just what you said and disregard the GI's suggestion. I have played around with prednisone enough to know what i am doing. Right now i just call my doc and say i need more pills, for awhile i self medicated.
Posted 10/16/2008 10:58 PM (GMT 0)
My Dr puts "use as directed" on the label and gives me 20mg, 10mg, and 5mg. If I ask, because (thankfully) it's been a while since I've been on it he says to taper by 2.5mg per week. Usually we use our best discretion, at least that's been my experience with 4 GI Drs I've had in the 10 years I've had this disease. It doesn't make sense to me to go all of the way back up to 60. I've only been started on that dose once, usually it's 40mg to start. Hope that helped a little.
Jen
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