I have been on steroids before for my asthma and had a bad reaction. I was on Prednisone, and some steroid nasal spray, and it was just bad, fatigue, headaches, acne, dizziness, nausea, and shaking among others. I am also overweight and am trying to lose weight and know that steroids can cause weight gain. I have lost 30 pounds since September 2007 and still need to lose 40 to be in "healthy weight range". I am wondering if anyone has just asked RA Dr to not prescribe the steroids. Are they necessary to come out of a flare? I just don't think I can handle them again, the side effects way out weighed the benefits. I've only used methylprednisolone in the 6-day dose-pak regimen. I use it only occasionally; perhaps 1 to 3 times per year. It works wonders for me. In the beginning I was on prednisone. For about 3 years I think. But for the last 13 years I have not had any prednisone. I just stay away from it no matter how bad I feel. I still have pretty bad flares, but I deal with them in other ways. Yeah, there are some on here who have refused to use prednisone. I however, am not one of them. I would definiatly be doing much worse without the pred I am on. I hope to come off of it soon. I have not really gained that much weight while on it. I think I added it up one time and I gain like 8-9 pounds a year. The blood pressure med I am on now, has made me gain 5lbs in less than a month.
I don't use steroids, either. I had bad reaction to them. Always felt worse when on them. I never did take for long, and won't take them again.
It was suggested by my RD to take prednisone while waiting for the mtx to work, but I declined. I had a fear of never being able to get off it and the worst of the flares only seemed to last a couple of days. I had some extra activity about a month ago and was prescribed a short-term burst, but waited it out instead. Would I take if things got really bad? Not sure, but I hope I won't have to think about it. 23 years with RA and I 've been on 2 pred packs in that entire timeI've never experienced serious adverse reactions from a 6-day medrol dosepak. It tends to cause mild insomnia for me, but considering the fact that during a flare I can barely stay awake for 8 hours, I'll take the insomnia so I can spend a couple of coherent hours with the kids!!! All of my doctors have told me (and research seems to back it up) that the long-term serious side effects like weight gain, bone loss, etc are very rare with a short-term, low-dose course of treatment. I was on a 6 day pack before I was dx when my ortho thought it was tendonitis. But my RD has not once offered steroids. Not sure why but Mobic takes away 90% of pain for me (although not inflammation). He hasn't offered even though MTX isn't taking inflammation down either. We are trying to be patient with that. I guess if I took pred it would be hard to tell if MTX was working. Although a steroid shot also didn't take down the inflammation.Like KatieG, my RA doc whom I've been seeing since 1986, has never offered prednisone or steroids, and I've never asked, though, I have had cortisone injections in my knees. My RA is controlled now with methotrexate and a biologic which I started in 2002, but I had joint damage by then as I've had RA since 1977. Getting that inflammation under control, through short term steriod use, or rest, pool therapy, fish or flaxseed oil, whatever may help, is important. Good luck and hope you start doing better real soon.