out of date Pred

[tgca]

For 2 weeks I have been taking 1 mg prednisone which was out of date in March ‘23. Would it have been effective as I seem to have some returning symptoms of GCA?

[Bcol]

March 23 is well past it's use by date and although it might be OK, chances are it won't work as well. If you have any possible returning GCA symptoms you need to get professional advice as soon as possible. Either your doctors, 111 or emergency room/casualty if they are not available.

[Koalajane in reply to Bcol]

What dose are you on now as wondering if it is say 6 mg where you take a 5 and a 1.

They are well out of date. I always check mine

[piglette]

It really depends where you have been storing it. If kept in a cool, dark place it should last better than if in the light somewhere.

[DorsetLady PMRGCAuk volunteer]

If you are only on 1mg [as profile might suggest] then it could be that you aren’t getting full benefit from the OOD tablets… how long have you been taking them?

But could also be that 1mg is not quite enough for your illness anyway….a bit more info would help.

[tgca in reply to DorsetLady]

I successfully reduced to 1 mg last year, tried in feb to get to 1/2 with your method but had a chest infection which sent me back to 1 mg. I ran out of Img gastro resistant pred 2 weeks ago so took the ood normal ones until I could fetch the new batch so I’m wondering whether the oods weren’t working?! Btw, Fellow Viking

[DorsetLady PMRGCAuk volunteer in reply to tgca]

Might be because plain tablets rather than EC -but I’d ditch the OOD ones anyway. A couple of months probably okay, but 9 months may be pushing your luck - even for Vikings 😉

Hope you get back on track…,

[tgca in reply to DorsetLady]

I’ll give I couple of days on 1 mg gastro one’s and see how it goes.. thanks for all your advice.

[PMRpro Ambassador]

In the context of what sort of dose? Having seen your later comment I'd think it COULD be the date though in theory it shouldn't be a problem. But the ingredients in the tablets are likely to be different anyway - and the fillers are known to sometimes affect how you respond to a given dose.

I even had 2 new scripts of E/C tablets, 5 and 2.So really - it might be the age, it might be the ingredients! Or it might be the weather ...

[Gimme]

It may or may not be the out of date tabs, and taking some that are in date will provide the answer if it goes away. Though I think that may be a bit of a red herring; if I had GCA and saw symptoms returning, I would seek medical advice and not take any chances.

[pjg24]

I guess the 1st thing Is so is have labs drawn to see how bad things are. Maybe you need more than 1mg?

[hurtingintx]

Probably won't be as effective, I would not take out of date prednisone. In date prednisone causes too many side effects as it is...talk to your doc about a new script