Fever for 5 days with headache and fatigue

others will comment on your reduction plan, it sounds way too fast to me. but as to your illness...i had bronchitis and then flu last winter (i tested negative but had all the symptoms, doc said) which knocked my pmr into a tizzy. i ended up increasing from 6 1/2 to 10 and staying there, unable to go back down to where i was or even just 1 mg higher. your return of symptoms seems to indicate youve gone too low too fast.

after reduction and You have reduced way too fast the dose. Initial dose of prednisone was correct, BUT usually people stay on the same dose 4-6 weeks before trying to reduce. So that would put you mid April for your first reduction . One should not rush and it should take at least 4 weeks before next reduction. I would guess that you should be now, if you tapered properly at about 15mg. It takes at least 2 weeks being on the same dose for your body to acclimate; you would not know if last reduction was too much before that time. I would guess that you have gone below the dose that you need to manage pain probably by several (2mg) steps. Corrective action is to go first to high dose for 5 days to a week to clear accumulated inflammation ( at least 15, and perhaps in your case might be 20mg), and then try to find proper dose that can manage your PMR symptoms. I would try to drop down to 15 and then start slow taper from there. If you search this site there is an explanation on how to reduce prednisone and the method is called DSNS .

Another bummer is that beside tapering too fast, you have just "shocked" your immune system with a cold that also contributed to how you feel. Please talk to your doctor and see what he recommends, but if it were me, I would go back to 20 for a few days and then try to reduce.

Note - not a medic, but had PMR for 4+ years now and have experienced and seen lots of cases. Don't rush, average PMR patient is treated for 5.9 years and only 25% of lucky ones get away with less then 2 years of treatment.

How many times were you tested for Covid-19? There is a 25% rate of false negatives with some tests.

But if it wasn't Covid-19, it was probably some other viral infection - and it isn't uncommon for that sort of thing to cause a flare of symptoms.

However - from 10mg daily dose it is far better to reduce 1mg at a time and preferably not as often as every 2 weeks. Reducing by more than 1mg per month is predictive of a flare/relapse (whichever word you want to use). No reduction should really be more than 10% of the current dose for a couple of reasons, at higher doses because it reduces the risk of steroid withdrawal symptoms and as you get lower it means you are less likely to miss the dose you are looking for: You are not reducing relentlessly to zero, you are looking for the lowest dose that manages the symptoms as well as the starting dose did. And at this level 1/2mg can make a big difference so 2mg at a time can be far too much.

Hi Colleen, 4 years on my PMR journey. I followed a Pred protocol similar to yours on the advise of my Rheumey. I came down with a stomach bug, had a flare, I tried to tough it out. Following the advise of my Rheumey increasing my Pred a little at a time. Over the course of a month or two I slowly increased my Pred from 7mg to 30 mg, ending up in a wheelchair. The one thing I have learned through this journey is CONTROL THE INFLAMMATION. Once it gets ahead of you and your are trying to catch up you are in big trouble. The pain is a side effect of the inflammation. Good luck on the of your PMR journey. 🙂