Help and advice needed on how much to raising my pred by after experiencing a lot of discomfort.

[Buenavista]

Morning guys from sunny Spain,

Your help is required again please.

I got down to 6 1/2mg of pred in March of this year and had a flare and had to go back up to 10mg. I then came down by 1/2mg every 2 weeks. I got down to 7 1/2mg in May, then came down 1/2mg every 4 weeks. I am now on 5mg. I have been on this amount for 36 days, did an extra 7 days as I am not sure what's happening. My worst side effect is my fuzzy/thick head. If it was not for this I could sail through, but I don't know what is happening at the moment. It seems like another flare, but a mini one. Until that point I thought I had cracked it.

If I go back up to 10mg it will be another year before I get down to 5 1/2mg.

I have always had pain in my left hand, which is worse than my right. I have 4 trigger fingers, slight pain in my arms, hips, buttocks, left knee only and my neck. I have also been unusually more tired as well.

There are 2 things I can think of which my have rocked the boat. For about 3 weeks I was grinding my teeth at night and ended up after 4 weeks, with an abscess and had to take antibiotics and pain killers. Which has cleared up. After this I went on the Dukan Diet to lose about 4 kilos. Do you think this could be the reason?

Sorry for the length of the message. I write as I talk.

Best regards

Buenavista

[Celtic PMRGCAuk volunteer]

Hello Buenavista

It may not be a flare - it could simply be that perhaps you are harbouring an infection of some sort causing inflammation in your body, or the recent abscess requiring antibiotics and painkillers may just have, as you suggested, "rocked the boat". Could simple ESR and CRP blood tests perhaps provide the answer?

To answer your question as to whether increasing back up to 10mg will entail another year getting back down to

5.5mg, not necessarily so (almost in the words of a song!). It is very often easier to get back down fairly quickly following a flare to the point just above where you last felt comfortable.

Perhaps a smaller increase back to, say, 7.5mg would be sufficient to see whether that eased the fuzzy head and the slight pain in the areas you mention.

Very frustrating for you when you had seemingly successfully got down to 5mg which can be a bit of a 'stumbling block' dose, but it seems that the abscess and its treatment may just have upset the apple cart.

At least you have the sunshine on your side - that's fast becoming a distant memory for those of us in the UK where we've been facing gale force winds and heavy rain over recent days. Get well soon.

[Buenavista in reply to Celtic]

Thanks Celtic for your quick reply,

I feel much happier now for your comments. I will get a blood test done. Also the doctor has arranged for a scan/tac on my head to make sure it's only the side effects of the pred. I will let you know how I get on.

Many thanks

Buenavista