Prednisolone and diarrhoe

[Buchanan16]

Hiya wondering if any of you lovely people can give me a bit of advice.My mum as you know has been doing great and we are on track going down to 12mg using DL 5 week taper.

My mum called me this morning to say she was up few times during night with diarrhoe altho she seems fine this morning so not sure if its just been a wee bug. She took all her meds as normal this morning but i was just wondering how long does it take for pred to get into her system and stay there. What do we do if diarrhoe was to continue ? How does it affect her medication?

Thanking you all in advance.

[PMRpro Ambassador]

As long as plain pred stays in her stomach for an hour it should have been absorbed well. Enteric coated takes longer and is absorbed much further down the gut so might be affected by diarrhoea.

If the diarrhoea were to continue for a few days then contact either the GP or 111 to see if she could have a hydrocortisone injection which would cover the adrenal side of things but not necessarily the PMR/GCA inflammation.

[Buchanan16 in reply to PMRpro]

Thank you PMRpro for your prompt reply as usual. Its plain pred she takes and i did say to her if she was able to keep it in for at least an hour she should be okay.We will keep an eye on it but hopefully its only a 24hr thing and no need for me to panic.

Thanks again.

[cranberryt]

If it persists, definitely get checked. One autoimmune can lead to another. I ended up with colitis and celiac two years into my PMR journey… my only symptom being constant diarrhea.