Debating my next reduction

go slow... 0.5mg is much safer way to go.  You will find on this forum many times repeated that reduction should be less then 10% of the dose.

Lindalee77, congratulations getting to 5 mg. When I get to 5 mg I will reduce by .5 use DSNS method and pause a couple weeks at each level. I know all the side effects, been a diabetic for over 50 years. I had a bad flare last spring, now I am a great believe in being patient. Stay positive and try keep a smile. 🙂

I think it's always hard to be so tantalisingly close to a goal. There is an overwhelming temptation to just get on with it. However, don't give in! 😄  Take this last lap as if you were playing Grandmother's  Footsteps - (whoops! Given away my age!). Tiny step by tiny step and get your reward. Good luck!

Hi I have been on pred. For 2 years started on 15mg now down to 6mg. A friend of mine started on 50mg in 2010 now down to 1mg per day can't stop all together without a flare. So good luck with it trying to come off completely.

I am at 2mgs and have been reducing at .5mgs. I stay there for 4 weeks and so far have not had a flare though I do have some aches which I feel do not warrant an in increase. I don't think it's worth the risk of rushing to end up increasing. 

You have done very well to get down to 5 in less than a year so don't rock the boat!

If you reduce from 5 by 1 mg. then that is 20%  and you could then find you have to increase again and end up taking more pred. overall. 5 is a very low dose  and I wouldn't think would be contributing much to your raised BP( do they test regularly? ) Best wishes.

Pred. did raise my BP, I remember but as the dose reduced so did the BP. Four years on I'm back to normal         ( well, ok for an eighty something ) 127/72.

 

It is recommended that reductions in a taper of this sort should be no more than 10% of the current dose - so at 5mg that would already be only 1/2mg.

It may feel slow - but it isn't slow if reducing in tiny steps doesn't lead to a flare. Once you flare subsequent reduction is often harder.

hi Lindalee.  The great thing about getting to 5 mg is any side effects you may have been experiencing will become much less significant and could disappear altogether.  I also achieved this feat of getting to 5 mg in a little under a year.  But starting at 7 mg I'd already been tapering by .5 mg per time.  Initially I was able to drop a further .5 in the middle of the taper, thereby dropping a whole mg each time.  You could consider doing that if your symptoms remain controlled.  I used dead slow method, and in the middle where you take the old dose two days, the new dose one day and the old dose two days again, at the second set of two days I would drop the a further .5 mg.  Thus my original "new" dose became my new "old" dose, and I had a new "new" dose, if that makes sense.  (Example:  Old dose is 5 mg, new dose is 4.5 mg, you are in the middle of the taper.  Take your old dose of 5 mg for two day, and your new dose of 4.5 for one.  then take your 5 mg again, for one day, 4.5 for one day, and then 4 mg.  Next day you would take 4.5 mg, and proceed with this as your "old" dose.)  I think this worked until about 3 mg. but since then I only taper by .5 mg at a time, and then very slowly, often having to attempt the taper more than once before it "takes".  I think at 1.5 I'm just barely at the level which controls the symptoms adequately.  I do know there are people who taper using only 1/4 mg!

Thanks everyone. I knew the answer was going to be 1/2 and that I just need to be patient. I will follow the advise of the people that I trust.