Second flare, symptoms starting to lessen.. should I take steriods?

Hello, I'm new to posting on this forum although reading through the posts has been really helpful!

I'm in my second flare, diagnosed two years ago and mesalazine pills and suppositories helped calm my symptoms right down so I think I was in remission for a while.

Recently had a flare, 5 - 10 bm with blood etc every day, stomach and back pain and couldn't eat any fibre. Was prescribed budesonide which helped for a day or two but then had awful side effects so I stopped and nurse prescribed prednisolone steroids. The local doctors kept messing up the prescription though and only sending one pack out which would last 3 days.. So didn't take them straight away and dealt with symptoms by going on the Scd intro diet, thought I might as well as not eating any fibre anyway!!

Now I can feel my body getting better and healing, symptoms lessening.

All that I read about steriods makes me worried about side effects and building tolerance to medicines, I'm 30. I don't want to wear out their effectiveness if they don't need to be used quite yet. Also, I've read about other medications on here like foam enemas etc which I haven't been offered and am wondering if I should try this first? Feel a bit like I'm getting a conveyor belt response from ibd nurse throwing steriods at me. My fecal calprotectin was around 600. Last time it was over 1,400 or something. I'm not against using the steriods just want to be absolutely sure, because I believe my ibd was caused in part by doctors throwing antibiotics at me for numerous things when they should have just tested before medicating, which I didn't realise at the time.

Anyway, long first post, thanks if you have read and any suggestions or advice would be really great,

thanks

Here is what I would do:
If you are getting better I don't think it would hurt to wait and see if the trend continues. Give yourself a week or so and see if you genuinely have improvement, if so, keep doing what you are doing. If you get worse or remain the same then take the steroids. I'm not a doctor, but I hear you on wanting to avoid steroids.

talk to your bones before you start giving them steroids

keep doing what you are doing -

oh, steroids suck !

all good advice from previous posters -

TT

Thanks for the responses

Haven't been offered any alternatives to the steriods, tried to ask about enemas but didn't get anywhere with it. I'm in the UK, which can be a postcode lottery with what they will and won't prescribe. Could try talking to the nurse again. Had a go with some Vsl3 probiotics which seemed to help, but came off all supplements to start this scd diet, will reintroduce after a while. Have been drinking a cup of coconut milk kefir before bed instead which has probiotics.

I think it's a good shout to continue with this diet for a while to watch what happens, have been keeping a diary and my bms are down to 1-2 a day and it's been just over a week. It's just still loose/ with mucus and a bit of blood so was wondering if the inflammation needed an extra something.. Will see how it goes!

I'll give the ibd nurse a call and ask about clippers and mesalazine enemas, thanks for the suggestions!

So mesalazine enemas, then add clippers if not clearing up. Thanks for explaining, it's good to get an idea of the order of medications and also to know that there are other options before prednisolone! I thought there were! Makes sense to try targeted medication first.. Kind of glad my prescription got messed up in the first place otherwise I'd have just taken the pred

Yeah why do they? Probably because they are encouraged to hand out pred, something to do with money and contracts I would have thought. I'm a bit cinical though, be interested to read what others thought.

They did try me on budesonide first, which is targeted steroid, but I had bad side effects.. Either that or an allergic reaction. Maybe it's likely that if I didn't take to that I wouldn't take to the clipper steroid, but nurse didnt talk about other options.

Luluu, as I'm sure you've experienced, we tend to be prescribed the cheapest option on the NHS regardless of side effects, until / unless it doesn't work, which means prednisolone tablets are often offered before slightly more expensive alternatives despite risk of long term side effects. I say slightly more expensive as the alternatives are still inexpensive compared with biologics. I personally think it's a false economy when you look at the long term picture eg osteoporosis risk.

A month of Clipper (1 x 5mg per day) is approx £60 whereas a month of 40mg (8 x 5mg per day) of pred tablets is more like £10.