Oral prednisone - experiences please

Box_Of_Frogs

Box_Of_Frogs

Well-Known Member
Joined
1 May 2007
Messages
6,517
Location
Deepest Wales
Visit site
Please, please does anyone have any experience of oral prednisone given as a last resort in cases of severe COPD/RAO? Good or bad, doesn't matter. Sunny is facing this but to my mind, if the "cure" (I know it's not a cure) is worse than the original disease then it's not worth considering. Sunny is 25. I'll post again after the endoscopy on Weds. Any spare vibes in the meantime are desperately needed x
 
Box_Of_Frogs said:
Please, please does anyone have any experience of oral prednisone given as a last resort in cases of severe COPD/RAO? Good or bad, doesn't matter. Sunny is facing this but to my mind, if the "cure" (I know it's not a cure) is worse than the original disease then it's not worth considering. Sunny is 25. I'll post again after the endoscopy on Weds. Any spare vibes in the meantime are desperately needed x
Click to expand...

My five year old was given oral Prednisolone as a last resort to try to help her survive an almost overwhelming allergic reaction a couple of months ago.
She's been given 1mg per kg bodyweight - so about 112 pills once a day, then after a month it was reduced to 0.75mg or 84 pills. The plan is to reduce the dose to nothing, as long as she doesn't become ill again, and then allergy test her (we suspect she is allergic to grass).
So far she's been absolutely fine on the Preds. I mix the pills with a little water and oral syringe her once a day, paying her with apple (her weakness :D). I was concerned initially, but according to my vet, there has never been a case of laminitis (if that's your concern) documented from oral Preds, only from injected Pred.
S :D
 
My old pony was treated with oral preds for summer dust allergy , it worked and was fine, only problem was the time and care I had to take counting up all the little pills that I had to put in his feed I fed him on concrete so i could see if any were left around the bowl and then picked them up and added a bit of chaff so all were eaten, the dose is reduced when you finish the course.
 
My mare had them last year to treat a viral infection, started at 90 pills a day, then 64, then 45. They easiest way we were told was to put water in their feed bowl, chuck the pills in, leave for a minute or so and they dissolve so you can just mix it straight in with their normal feed/chaff and mine was none the wiser!

Like teasle said, the hardest bit is counting the pills out!
 
Not for my horse, but for my dog (not quite the same, I know!). She suffered awful side effects, became incontinent, ravenously hungry, weight gain, increased thirst. All stopped once the oral pred was stopped.

I don't know too much about the side effects in horses, we certainly weren't made aware of the potential side effects in dogs. I'd want to discuss this aspect with my vet before medicating if it were me, just to be aware of things to keep an eye on.

Sending you vibes for the endoscopy, hope it all goes ok :(
 
I have been reading your posts regarding your horse with much interest as my boy's breathing issues sound almost identical to him although my boy is a bit younger (17). He has been on prednisolone all summer, the same last year and for three years prior to that, we tried the inhaled steriods and he got so stressed out by having the mask over his face we had to resort to the oral steriods. My vet prescribes the steriod in a powder form, he has never shown any adverse reactions to it, (I worried about lami but my vet said there was no incidence of it with this drug) There is a difference though between prednisone and prednisolone and am not sure about the side effects of prednisone.
 
My horse has been on the tablet form of these for since June. He started off on 100 tabs a day and it was reduced to 50 then 25. We got him down to 15 but had to increase them as his inflammation in his guts came back. So far he is currently on them and back down to 17 tabs a day. I just mix them in with his feed.

We have had no issues with him being on the long term which he will be on them for life. We are just trying to identify if it a summer only issue or a all year round issue. So it looks like the issue he has is due to something he is eating.

Good luck with your horse and I hope you get some news on Wed.
 
Like the posters above, the biggest headache was counting out the pills into his feed bucket! My boy was prescribed them for persistent thrush, and it certainly is the only thing that ever cleared it. However, he did get quite bolshy on them - my instructor compared it to the mood swings pill-popping body builders get! I eventually took him off them as he was becoming a handful, but a real shame as nothing else has been as effective for the thrush. Definitely worth a try, and see how your horse does on them. Good luck!
 
Prednisone is not usually prescribed for horses as it has been shown to be much less effective. My horse had prednisolone powder and we had no problems other than he found it very bitter - we mashed it into jam and applesauce and never had a problem after that. If using the powder you should really use a mask as it is very fine fly away powder and you will end up breathing a bit in!

Dexamethasone has been found to be more effective in the continued presence of the allergen - my horse is also allergic to grass pollen as well as a few other things and sadly is deteriorating each year. He is only 10 and sadly once I have completed a LOS claim will be PTS. This partly becuase the drugs are just so expensive and he cannot work despite the drugs from late March to early October. He has to stand in all day to protect him from the pollen - well to try to anyway. Not much of a life really. It is such a waste.

Hope you get better more manageable news of your horse!
 
I found the easiest way of feeding them (after the counting which I did into a dark coloured bowl!) was to pestle and mortar them to a powder then mix with sugar beet into the feed. Before she came to me the show cob was becoming stroppier by the day of it being syringed in and has never since been able to take a paste wormer because of that, she almost became dangerous with striking out both back and front as soon as you walked in the box and I don't see the point of stressing them un necessarily.
 
My mistake re predisone - meant prednisolone. I'm stunned by the fact that vets report no laminitis with oral, only injected! I e-mailed Prof Knottenbelt as he helped me 3 years ago with Angel, my rescued mare with dreadful ragwort poisoning. Unbelievably, he's in the USA on a speaking tour but replied within 12 hours!!! The man is an absolute saint. He has, however, raised some questions about the symptoms Sunny has, which may indicate something different (or additional) is going on in his lungs. Sunny is being endoscoped Weds to try to find the source of the frequent small nosebleeds he's recently started having. For anyone else in a similar position, he's also recommended no exercise until this is sorted, which is a relief for me. I've been concerned at the advice to keep up the gentle ridden work to encourage him to breathe as deeply as possible but with a resting breaths-per-minute rate of 40 - 50 and an occasional terrible feeling that he was about to collapse underneath me, I'm much happier to abandon that for now.

If anyone is interested, I can either PM the Prof's advice or I can post it on here, with the clear understanding that it relates solely to Sunny. Many thanks everyone and I'll leet everyone know what happens on Weds x
 
Not really a mistake - prednisone is the US name for prednisolone - it's the same drug.

I don't know about horses, but I've been on oral (and IV) prednisolone myself (for Crohn's Disease). It isn't a cure, but can be remarkably effective at alleviating symptoms. High doses over a long period can be damaging (I had to stop taking it), but it can be very helpful in treating allergies and other forms of inflammation.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top