Vitamins.

[Flosy]

Hi just wondering if I can take vitamins,as I have come off my steroids but still on leflunomide 1 10mgs tablet a day.feeling good at moment,do get some aches and pains.just wondering about taking sleeping tablets as I don't sleep very well.just some advice please.thank you.

[PMRpro Ambassador]

What vitamins were you thinking of? It is far better to get them from diet than tablets as the body utilises them far better when natural, And more isn't necessarily better.

As for sleeping - tablets are best as a last resort. There are lots of things to try with what is called "sleep hygiene" - lots of advice on the internet. Something like Nytol is worth trying. But anything more than that you need to discuss with your doctors.

[winfong]

I've taken multi-vitamins most of my adult life, and all my docs seem to be fine with it. I think you have to take a lot of vitamins for the ill effects to turn up. And I eat fairly well, so I'm sure I'm already getting a good amount in my diet.

I take prescription sleeping pills maybe once or twice a month. They're invaluable when you really need to reset your sleep clock. A lot of people to seem to become dependent on them though, which is not good. Maybe a prescription with a limited number of pills might help from getting hooked.

[PMRpro Ambassador in reply to winfong]

It very much depends - there are a few that it is very easy to take too much of depending on what you eat and maybe double up on tablets, especially the fat soluble vitamins which you store in the body and they can mount up.

[piglette]

I totally agree with PMRPro, most vitamins are available in a good, balanced diet and a lot cheaper! Have you checked your diet to see if you are getting your daily nutrients? There are some vitamins such as vitamin D which is not in many foods and is mainly got from the sun which is not always around in the winter in UK. You can sometimes need Folic acid too. Have you had blood tests checking any nutrients while on steroids? Most people do.

[PMRrunner]

I would check with a pharmacist, I'm fairly sure I was advised not to take extra vitamins when I was on Leflunomide

[Flosy]

Thank you all for your reply.

[Sharitone]

You may have seen that Michael Moseley has done a 5-part series of short podcasts on BBC sounds entitled Sleep Well that gives some new tips on sleeping, including keeping your socks on when you go to bed, then taking them off just before you want to sleep. Just be warned - don't listen when you want to be wide awake because the presentation is deliberately very soporific!

As far as the dreaded sleeping tablets are concerned, they worked for me when pred virtually stopped me sleeping. I gradually reduced them in tandem with the pred dose and finally got off them with no problem when I got to about 5mg of pred.