Blood Pressure with PMR

[29Pain00]

Has anyone had low blood pressure occur when you are trying a tapering dose of prednisone? I went from 10mg to 9mg. I have been on 9mg for 5 days now.

[piglette]

I have got down to 5mg. My lowest blood pressure recently has been 97/49. I have fainted a couple of times. I thought it might be the adrenal glands causing it. I have always suffered with low blood pressure on the other hand and the odd faint.

[29Pain00 in reply to piglette]

Thank you

[piglette in reply to 29Pain00]

What is your blood pressure reading at the moment?

[29Pain00 in reply to piglette]

This morning it was 123/72 and I feel fine. Yesterday it was 95/55 and I felt very weak and light headed. Day before it was 102/59 and I was very light headed. Before, I usually ranged in mid 120s-130/75-79

[piglette in reply to 29Pain00]

That sounds quite good today. In fact nowadays over 120/80 is considered pre hypertension. I think below 90/60 is considered low. I am not sure the new recommended levels are really sensible, they used to be much higher, probably trying to get us to take hypertensive tablets. I must admit I feel 102/59 can make me feel quite light headed, particularly if I stand too long. I find mine gets higher during the day and eating helps the light headedness.

[Soraya_PMR]

How low is low?

Cortisol in the body does help in controlling BP, and too little of it (adrenal insufficiency for whatever cause) can cause spasmodic BP, falling particularly when standing from sitting (postural hypotension). For this reason stand carefully to let your body acclimatise and prevent faints or falls. Take particular care getting out of bed, take it in stages and maintain sitting on side of bed for a while before attempting to stand.

Just reread your previous thread, see you started at 10mg a month ago. Probably a bit soon to be concerned about adrenal insufficiency. And in theory 9mg isn’t in the adrenal zone, but if you’re a poor absorber of pred, who knows?

You should log an extremely low BP with your doc. Seek emergency treatment if you experience vomiting or diarrhoea, or have sudden penetrating pain in back, legs or stomach.

In the meantime ensure you have plenty of fluids to increase blood volume, and a little salt (bag of crisps?) might help.

Are you on any beta blockers or anti hypertensive meds?

[PMRpro Ambassador]

As Soraya says - how low is low? Is it persistently low or are you having syncope episodes (sudden, temporary drops in BP causing fainting)?

[Noosat]

I am down to 2.5mg of prednisone and recently noticed low blood pressure and have wondered about it.

[Hidden]

I am having the exact opposite problem. My blood pressure throughout my life has even typically slow.....usually 90/100 over 60 or 70 without any dizziness or any light headedness. At the beginning of my Prednisone taking (15 mg or so) my BP still ran the same. Now I am at 7 mg Prednisone and my BP I rising. I had it taken last week and it was 160/80. Not sure if it is Prednisone related or just the natural way my body has decided to take at this age (70). An ideas or similar stories?

[Lynvan]

I had a blood test after I got down to 3.5 of pred . Next evening I received a phone call from a new doctor at the practice saying I needed to have my blood pressure taken right away because I had no adrenal glads working. I went straight away , I have been on ped. for 5 years . 230\186.given blood pressure tablets and it went down quickly. I was told I need to keep an eye on the blood pressure when trying to reduce! Back to 7.5 for now.

[PMRpro Ambassador in reply to Lynvan]

But poor adrenal function usually results in LOW BP. And the practice should have been monitoring your BP the entire time since pred INCREASES your BP.