Full Flare Prevention - Help

[Skier321]

7 days ago I got my 5th jab Moderna bivalent and in the same arm same day my +65 flu jab. I have been on 6.5 mg of prednisone for over 3 weeks now with no issues. I am tapering at .5 mg per month. The last few days I am feeling stiffness in the back of my legs, lower back and neck.they are those niggly feeling things. For the jabs to benefit me apparently you need two weeks to build up resistance. Question, should I wait another week at 6.5 to get the be benefit of the jabs ? 2nd Question, should I go to 11.5 mg then for 5 - 10 days or number of days to get rid of the nigglys. I am trying to avoid a full blow Flare like I had in December and lost 6 months of tapering. Thank you all again for your wise advice.

[jinasc]

Me, I would up it to 10mg for 5 days and then come down slowly to where you are now.

The tap is dripping and you need to stop it from building up.

[Skier321 in reply to jinasc]

thank you yes I believe the tap is dripping

[PMRpro Ambassador]

Only you can tell - is it worsening or staying much the same? Was the flare in December due to a vaccination?

[Skier321 in reply to PMRpro]

staying about the same last few days. The Flare in December was about month after my third jab. I was reducing 1 mg a month back then and inflammation and stiffness was building so at 8 mg went back up to 15 mg and have been reducing by .5 since reaching 10.5 in beginning of March with no stiffness.

[PMRpro Ambassador in reply to Skier321]

Have you seen what we often suggest for a flare? It can work by taking 5mg above where the flare appeared for a week to 10 days before a relatively quick drop back to just above the dose where it happened. It does depend whether the jab is causing the problem - my flare with the second jab lasted about 5 or 6 weeks and then went again. The important thing is to keep an eye on developments and not let it get away from you.

[Skier321 in reply to PMRpro]

Thank you yes a delicate balancing act that we all deal with. I want to try and stay at 6.5 for another week to get max benefit of the jabs (14 days) but don’t want to wait too long if I am starting to flare.