Fellow Transplant Patients

[Panda_9]

I would say you need a constant dose every day when youve got a fully functioning transplant. It is so important not to skip any medications otherwise suffer the consequences. I missed mine a fair few times because I would always forget to take them. If I get another transplant Im going to stick them to my forhead!

[coravh]

I would say you need a constant dose every day when youve got a fully functioning transplant. It is so important not to skip any medications otherwise suffer the consequences. I missed mine a fair few times because I would always forget to take them. If I get another transplant Im going to stick them to my forhead!

If you do not have diabetes, many transplant centers now put you on every other day prednisone. This is to ensure that your adrenal glands do not shut down, so you can then be weaned off the prednisone if necessary. Because prednisone affects blood sugars they do not do this for people with diabetes.

Cora

[Panda_9]

First Ive heard of that. I took it everyday all along and then even after the kidney stopped working until I was weaned off slowly.

[sandman]

If you do not have diabetes, many transplant centers now put you on every other day prednisone. This is to ensure that your adrenal glands do not shut down, so you can then be weaned off the prednisone if necessary. Because prednisone affects blood sugars they do not do this for people with diabetes.

Okay, Prednisone is bad for diabetics?  So what do patients who are diabetic need to take if they can't handle the prednisone?

[angieskidney]

If you do not have diabetes, many transplant centers now put you on every other day prednisone. This is to ensure that your adrenal glands do not shut down, so you can then be weaned off the prednisone if necessary. Because prednisone affects blood sugars they do not do this for people with diabetes.

Okay, Prednisone is bad for diabetics?  So what do patients who are diabetic need to take if they can't handle the prednisone?

I think the dosage is just altered. But depending on the hospital you go through sometimes they put you on other medications. I don't have diabetes myself so I can't really answer this as well as a diabetic can.

[livecam]

I'm not aware of every other day Prednisone.  I was on daily doses that were continually tapered until we reached 5mg/day.  I then requested and was allowed to wean to 0.  We went down in 1mg increments until zero was reached.  Many transplant centers these days have steriod free protocols that have worked well for patients.  Old school doctors tend to be more conservative and promote steroids.  My HMO neph told me the world was going to end and my kidney was going to reject if I did this.  He agreed to allow it if UCLA would say OK which they did.  Its been two years now and labs last week were nearly perfect. 

[angieskidney]

Well they will never bring me down to 0 because when I had my original kidneys removed I also had my adrenal glands removed as well (they were all infected). They say that is why they have me on the Prednisone dosage that they do. I am not exactly sure why ...

[Panda_9]

Im pretty sure they still put everyone on prednisolone here. If its going to give me a better chance then ill take it. I hate it, but Id rather that than be on dialysis. A kidney can be failing long before you even know it. Took 2 years to get a diagnosis when my kidney was rejecting.

[angieskidney]

Im pretty sure they still put everyone on prednisolone here. If its going to give me a better chance then ill take it. I hate it, but Id rather that than be on dialysis. A kidney can be failing long before you even know it. Took 2 years to get a diagnosis when my kidney was rejecting.

You had none of the signs?


*corrected grammer

[Panda_9]

Not really, just extremely tired and started getting nauseas. My creatinine went up from 0.08 to 0.11 over a couple of years. Other than that no other symptoms and nothing else showing up in my blood work. It took a couple of biopsies to get the diagnosis of chronic rejection of unknown cause.

[renal30yrs]

Puffy face bother you?  In the old days massive dosages of radiation was the standard regimen.  Guess what? many died.