Unable to persuade my doctor to prescribe preds. under 2.5 mg let alone 0.5 mg
Tabs come in 5 and 1 mg white. I cut the 5 tabs to get the dosage right.eg 7.5 would be 1 x 5 and half of a 5.
Or have I got it wrong that you are at 2.5 and tried to reduce down from there?
The smallest tablets I can get are 2,5 - but I break them in half so I can get down to 1,25 and that is working at the moment - down to 11,25 now.
Happy Easter to one and all.
The answer may be at this level to drop one day in the first week and then two days in the second? It's a very low level and your body must be producing corisol.
Then how does s/he expect you to be able to reduce? Even 2.5mg is far too big a step for most people once you are under 20mg daily dose.
I can only assume you are on enteric coated pills - red 5mg and brown 2.5mg rather than on the plain white non-coated variety. The enteric coated sort must not be cut, the whole point of the coating is to protect your stomach from the pred. Enteric coated tablets are, as far as I know, only available in the UK. The rest of the world manages fine with the ordinary uncoated white sort.
On the other hand, if you have white tablets then insist your GP provide you with 1mg tablets - and these can be cut to give 0.5mg doses. See another doctor in the practice if necessary.
If all that fails follow this link
https://patient.info/forums/discuss/pmr-gca-website-addresses-and-resources-35316
In the first reply you will find the "Dead slow and nearly stop" reduction plan I have used to reduce below 10mg for the first time in 5 years! I'm at 4mg and heading for 3 (I hope). It is being used by a few rheumatology consultants for patients who have difficulty reducing. Usually I would expect someone to drop in 1mg drops but it is also possible to use it to reduce in 2.5mg steps if you are on enteric coated pills.
If you are having to drop by 2.5mg at a time I would suggest repeating each of the steps:
1 day new dose, 7 days old dose
1 day new dose, 7 days old dose
1 day new dose, 6 days old dose
1 day new dose, 6 days old dose
1 day new dose, 5 days old dose
1 day new dose, 5 days old dose
and so on.
It really should be possible - even without being able to do it with a shorter time period for each 0.5mg.
I don't know - why do some doctors want to make it harder?
Janet - if these are the red or brown enteric-coated tablets they must not be broken. If they are white that is OK.
Interesting Eileen - I wonder why?
How about pale-blue uncoated ones?
They are "marked" with a split down the middle so I assume that I am OK.
They are danish tablets.
Thanks for "keeping an eye on me" !
Enteric coated have an outside coating which is resistant to the acid conditions in the stomach. They pass straight through and then break down in the different gut conditions further down the gut and are absorbed there. This has the advantage that the pred doesn't irritate the lining of the stomach which was thought to lead to ulcers and worse. Some doctors don't think it makes any difference, they think it is a high level in the blood that causes the damage. Most people do seem more comfortable with enteric coated but there are some people for whom it makes no difference - and a load who have used yoghurt to "line their stomach" before taking their pred and it has worked fine!
Any tablet that has a groove down the middle can be assumed to be "splitable" - some people will tell if there isn't one you shouldn't cut it because you can't guarantee that there is an even distribution of the active substance through the tablet. Ask the manufacturers and they will tell you they are all made in the same way - the only difference is when there is a coating.
How pretty though - blue Danish tablets! Here they give out one size of all sorts of things and tell you to cut them - usually when they are tiny tablets that are hard enough to find when whole. And then you have to cut them!!!!
It is probably that the tablets you are being prescribed are the coated variety and do not come smaller than 2.5mg. I had them and went down from 20mg to 10mg, you have to go slowly as Eileen suggests, not one big jump all at once, and they must NOT be cut. You could ask your GP for the cheap and cheerful non coated variety which are 5mg and 1mg and can be cut.
i wish i had , had this information when my doctor reduced me it was far too quick i wont be doing that again. Going to follow the "dead slow" reduction from now on even though i hate being on pred. Thank you for sharing this information
I always give the links when someone asks about reductions - but what I have posted here is an extra slow version because Mary needs to do it 2.5mg at a time. If you are reducing in 1mg steps you generally don't need to repeat each stage, once is enough.
None of us likes being on pred - but rushing at a reduction is more likely to fail and you end up at a higher dose again and having to start again.