Weight loss with PMR

Kathy, you are one of a minority - most of us gain weight on steroids and envy you so much!

I have met only one other with weight loss and he is fairly new too, so can't really help you out with the question.

All I can say is that the weight dropped rapidly off me once I began to reduce, so chances are it will work the other way round, although with PMR/steroids you can really never tell.

I will say here that you had a very rapid reduction scheme and I am wondering if that has anything to do with the weight loss, but if you are feeling ok in the 'normal' sense then I would advocate letting sleeping cats lie.

 

I lost twenty lbs before the pred kicked in and then gained it and 15 lbs back. Don't buy too many new clothes just yet.

Hi Kathy,Have you any other symptoms or changes?

I'm not suggesting this, but I lost a stone in weight in 2 weeks about a month after being diagnosed with PMR and starting pred 20mgs,I then found I had developed diabetes which may or may not have been triggered by steroids although I had been prediabetic in recent years.

But I must stress,I'm not suggesting that this is the case with you.

My recommendation is to go to the "Professional Reference" tab at the top of the page and select "P", then find "polymyalgia-rheumatica". Do you have the symptoms described there? Look at the recommendations for prednisone which will look like this so something is wrong, IMO.

     15 mg daily for six weeks, then

     12.5 mg daily for six weeks, then

     10 mg daily for one year, then

Since your internist is not following these recommendations I would ask him the following questions:

     What is my white blood cell count? Mine was 25000 when I was loosing weight and I continued to loose weight until it was in the 3000 range. This is an auto immune disease and your body is attaching itself so you loose weight.

     What are  my CRP and SED/ESR? "CRP < 5.0"="" and="" "sed/esr="">< 11.0". if he doesn't know then show him the sheet. only about 13,000 people are diagnosed with this in a year.

i continued to loose weight until these blood component levels were in the normal range. 11.0".="" if="" he="" doesn't="" know="" then="" show="" him="" the="" sheet.="" only="" about="" 13,000="" people="" are="" diagnosed="" with="" this="" in="" a="" year.="" i="" continued="" to="" loose="" weight="" until="" these="" blood="" component="" levels="" were="" in="" the="" normal="">

i continued to loose weight until these blood component levels were in the normal range.>

Thank you to those who responded! I am in the USA, so bloodwork measurements read differently...however,  at diagnosis in March my Sed rate was 87, C-reactive Protein 66.8, white blood cell count 11,441, severe anemia, crippling pain at night and in the am...but it would dissipate after about 1/2 hr in the morning. 10 mg of prednisone relieved the symptoms within the hour! Initial tapering, down to 7.5 went well, but 2 attempts to taper down from that were terrible. I will now follow the advice of the patients on this forum and not attempt to taper down for a long time. My rheumatologist made the diagnosis based on all of the above bloodwork and a description of my symptoms. Could it be so ething else?

I was diagnosed in early May and in 30 days lost around 10 pounds (i am in the usa as well).  Didn't have much appetite the first month either.  Since then I have pretty much stabilized at the lower weight but i was already not heavy so didn't need to lose any.  I started at 15 mg pred and it didn't fully knock out the pain and stiffness so they upped me to 20 mg taken 10 mg am and pm.  The split dosing worked well for my pain relief but then my regular doctor suggested i try to cut back to 10 mg after 3+ weeks at 20mg/l.  That was a big mistake and the experiment lasted only 24 hours and went back to my split dosing of 10/10.  As happened to me and others have suggested I think you were cutting down the dosing much too soon.  It is good that you were getting relief within only 10 mg pred though.

Since then I have i seen a rhematologist who wanted me to take my full 20 mg/l in the am only.  I have done that now for nearly a month and taking the 20 mg in the am is not fully successful in knocking out my am pain and stiffness.  As far as early pain and stiffness i was better off with the split dosing.  I see the rhematologist next week and see where we from here.

good luck and better health!

When I reduce pred I now do it 2.5mg at a time. When I do this, I do not have the pain or other side effects associated with the abrupt drop of 10mg in one shot. This is the way I went from 40mg to 30. Your results may vary but let the forum know...

40.             Going to                           30.                    Next reduction start

37.5       V       35.    V.     32.5      V     30.     V

           5 days.      5 days.          5 days        15 day to next reduction

another interesting thing that I noticed is that my blood pressure (systolic and diastolic) as well as heart beat and weight decrease in a steady ramp as I reduce pred. I chart this using excel and plot the data using linear regression. During a relapse in May, I noted they increased in a step function when I tapered from 17.5 to 15mg. Listen to your body, I wish I knew then what I know now!

Hi Kathy,

Yes, I also lost about 12 kg at one point, very early on in my preds intake for RA. It was quite alarming. For the first time in my life I got to get a good look at my own skeleton!

But then I soon put much of it back on. After about a year, the weight gain slowed and eventually evened out at about 4kg below my pre-RA weight, which actually suits me fine.