Can’t get my rheumatologist to give me enough medrol

Hey carnut, I too am about 3mo in on this "nutzo" journey. Started on 15mg of prednisone and it worked like a miracle, literally got me virtually pain free within hours of taking my 1st dose! However I wanted off of this powerful drug to quickly and with my Rheumy's blessings proceeded a less than terrific rollercoaster of an unpleasant ride! Bottom line.....I now have a new doc. and am on a greater dosage than 1st began, 16mg.

Is it possible for you to get another doctor, one that might be more familiar w/pmr? Hopefully he/she would be more liberal with dispensing the appropriate amount of medication for you, a dosage that would help keep you more comfortable while still trying to taper. As I've come to learn, this is indeed a complicated and frustrating disease to cope with. Try to hang in there!

You've got to find another doctor if your current doctor won't slow down the reduction or give enough prednisone to allow for a slower reduction.  Some people can get by with a fairly fast reduction when they are taking over 20 mg per day but once you get below 15 mg, reducing 1 mg a week is guaranteeing a flare every time in my opinion and experience.  Been there - done that.  You've just got to get on a very slow reduction schedule or you'll have a train wreck again sooner than later.

I agree with the others.  Hangs your doctor or see another in the practice if you can. I’ve tapered to 12.5 from 25 but it’s taken 15 months! I’m very sensitive to changes in the dosage so I’m like a snail. The other thing to remember when you taper is to take extra care in pacing and rest. The Pred deals with symptoms but is not a cure - the benefit of lower dosage is that it reminds you of that. I feel as if my body is just about keeping the pain at bay and I’m not going to rattle the cage! Hopefully a bit more care about exercise/life/balance will help ease the causes of the pain and the body to heal itself. You really need an understanding GP. Please let us know how you get on. This sort of pain is quite wretched and incapacitating - wish the GPS who dish out the pills knew what it was really like! 

Change not hangs your doctor - bit extreme! (Predictive text - oh for an edit button..) x

"What should I do?"

Find another who doesn't think patients all conform to the textbook and their personal predilections about reducing the dose! Everyone is different and some people a) need more pred than others and b) can't cope with constant changes in dose, even if the trend is supposedly downwards. 

Top experts in PMR/GCA have said in the medical literature that in PMR a reduction rate of more than 1mg PER MONTH is predictive of flares. There are doctors who believe that flares are par for the course, part of the disease process. No they aren't - the most likely cause of flares, big or little, is reducing too far or too fast. There are many people on the forums who have flared with their doctor's orders and got into terrible tangles with their dose. Once they switch to one or other of the slow approaches we bang on about on the forums day after day, week after week, they are able to reduce without steroid withdrawal pain (which is so similar to PMR you can't tell which is which except withdrawal is immediate, flares take time) and without significant flare problems - as soon as you identify a return of symtoms you stop reducing, even go back to the last dose.

When you reduce every week you overshoot what you are looking for at every stage of this journey: the lowest dose that manages the inflammation AT THIS STAGE. I won't be the lowest you get to, just the lowest for now. and when you reduce every week you have no idea at all where it went wrong - 1mg ago, 3 mgs ago or even more.

What you need is a doctor who will work with you and not assume they know better. No-one knows your body better than you do.

So, thanks to everyone for their advice. “What should I do” was probably a rhetorical question, as I really do know what I SHOULD do. I will contact my gp

And see if he will work with me, if the Rheumy doen’t come around. 

   I am just so aggravated by the arrogance of many doctors I have

seen lately. I have done my research

concerning this, and other problems that I have, and mostly, they refuse to listen!

Actually, I am doing OK on 18mg  at this time, and just am trying to keep this journey as relatively pain free as possible.