Help tapering advice

[bakingD]

Help please in muddle with my tapers-was trundling along on 5 mg not wanting to admit gad overshot the dose needed and as winter drew on pain got worse going up into my neck etc-us scabs of shoukders showed bursitis-had upped Pred to 7mg ,10mg,10mg,7 mg and then a few days on 6mgvand pain was awful yesterday felt v low do took 10 mg again today and pain now tolerable much less intense -now what do I do???a few days on 10 then back to 7??PRM since Nay 2018 thanks lovely forum friends!!!

[HeronNS]

Are you getting any treatment for the bursitis? It could be the pred isn't helping as much as you'd like because it's not actually the PMR causing the problem at the moment. On the other hand with head and neck issues we do need to be mindful of the possibility of GCA. Whatever it is you undoubtedly should not be tapering at this time, not until you (and your doctor and perhaps a physiotherapist) have sorted out the actual cause. Meantime, try to relax the muscles which may be contributing to the pain, however is best for you (I find heat helpful).

[bakingD in reply to HeronNS]

I think my neck and head pain as is on one side is coming from the shoulder and had steroid injection a few weeks ago which helped a bit but not totally

Will get a review with my rheumatologist

Kate Gilbert in her book mentions neck pain she had just PMR so am hoping mine is just PMR!!

Thanks for advice

[HeronNS in reply to bakingD]

My neck pain was terrible before I started pred. 15 mg wiped out all pain within a couple of days. and it's never returned. Not the PMR version of neck pain anyway. I do have extensive OA in my neck, and my shoulders have troubled me since pred apparently weakened the muscles.

On the last lap to a taper to .5 (one half) mg now, fifth year on pred.

[bakingD in reply to HeronNS]

Wow well done that must be amazing to ge on so little

[HeronNS in reply to bakingD]

I'm not holding my breath but I think it's because PMR is finally letting go of me. I'm taking no chances and tapering by doing each step of the long version of Dead Slow Nearly Stop twice over. Three months to taper by half a mg! But I'd been stuck at 2-ish for a couple of years and this method is now working for me.

[PMRpro Ambassador]

As you admit you were too low on 5mg you will most likely need more than 2 days at 10mg to clear out the inflammation that has accumulated. You can take 10mg for up to 7 to 10 days and then still be able to drop back to 7mg because I really don't think you are going to get away with less. To be at 7mg after 14 months is pretty good going really - the average time to get to 5mg is 18 months - and an average of that means a lot of people take longer!

[bakingD in reply to PMRpro]

Thanks that makes sense and I feel so much better today on the 10 mg think if it was GCA then 10 mg wouldn’t have helped