6mp, liver enzymes and feeling very low

     Seasons...sorry you are going through this.  I took 6MP for seven years prior to my surgery.  When I first started, it took 3 months to "kick in" along with my tapering dose of prednisone.  Am I mistaken or is ALT a test for pancreatic enzyme levels?  I was a lab tech from 1965 through 1986 and cannot remember some tests.  I do know that when I was on the 6MP (50 mgm) my bilirubin (liver test) was ALWAYS twice the normal limit but my GI doctor never seemed concerned.  When admitted to the hospital in 2008, my pancreatic enzyme levels were sky high.  I thought the ALT was one of them...I may be mistaken.  My doctor immediately stopped the 6MP.  Two weeks later the blood work returned to normal, and guess what my doctor did?  Yep, put me right back on the 6MP .  Before starting Remicade (because 6MP was  doing nothing) he had me stop the 6MP two weeks prior.  Remicade and Humira both failed and I had surgery in 2010.

     OH...by the way, I went to a chiropractor too...all he did was give me two fractured vertebrae in my thoracic spine because prednisone gave me full blown osteoporosis....so beware!!!

notsosicklygirl

I was hoping you would respond. I will suggest that. Can you explain how you worked out? I have to look up allopurinol. Forget what that is. What were you sxs at the time? Mine if maily bleeding. I didn' even have a bm yesterday. For the past bunch of weeks I've been mostly blood free too. I was off the cort enemas for maybe 2 weeks too. The first day of blood I did one though then 2 days later more blood. It's small but it's how it all started last year. I want off the pred too and was so excited to be down to 5mg. I wan to look and feel normal again. thanks for your concern.

seasons21 - my liver enzymes were high when I was at an ~5mg dose pred.  My GI kept me at the same dose of Imuran, ordered a full liver panel a week later and everything came back normal - and they've been normal since then.  I'm sure this is different for everyone, but wanted to give you some hope that some folks do adjust to it.  Hang in there.

Hi Seasons,

I'm so sorry to hear that the 6mp is affecting your liver enzymes!  I don't know if I believe your GI when he says the 6mp wasn't therapeutic yet.  My GI was actually really suprised I started getting symptoms when dropping to 10mg of Prednisone and I have only been on Imuran for 1 month.  He said it should be working already. I'm not sure if 6mp is different or not though.  Can they give you the Promethus labs blood test that checks to see if the 6mp is at the therapeutic level in your body?  I'm going to get that test this week to see if I am taking enough Imuran.  I just had my ALT tested today and it actually came back lower than a month ago (<6 instead of 9 last month).  My WBC is at 16 though, higher than a month ago, and I have been getting some symptoms now that I'm back at 15mg of Prednisone. :( 

Try not to get too discouraged, I know it can be hard though. All the up and down - you think you are getting better than all of a sudden the symptoms come back. It can be so hard to figure out what will work to make us better, and nobody wants to be on Prednisone this long. I know I sure don't want to go back up in the dose again. I just want my body back as well.

I suppose the cortenemas couldn't hurt, depending how far up your bleeding is. I keep getting a pain in my lower left abdomen so not sure the enemas hit there otherwise I'd suggest to my GI I try them again. Its definitely worth a shot and not with all the side effects of the oral Pred!

I was on 100mg/day azathioprine in the summer but it caused pancreatitis after 8 weeks.
Debilitating pain.

So now on 50mg 6MP for the last 4 weeks.

Doc said to take it every day but its just to powerful for my system so take is every second day.
I weigh 64kg (140 pounds) so get away with the lower effective dosages of meds.

On an average of 25mg/day so this works out at 0.4mg/KG (0.17mg/pound) body weight.

The drug causes tiredness even at that so take it with evening meal and sleep it off.

My bloods were done for 6 weeks and all is 'acceptable'.
WBC dropped but still in range.
Iron levels dropped a bit too but taking supplements keeps then normal.

Pancolitis is in remission, normal stool. no blood. Tending more to constipation which is fine after
years of bloody diarrhea.

Take 20g/day sunflower seeds.

Tapering prednisolone really slow. on 2.5mg/day now down from 20mg.
enjoying good sleep and getting my mind back

Colitis is too serious to be messing about experimenting with different meds. Wasted vast amounts of time and money on useless alternative remedies.

Just hope you find the right meds that work for you.