MethylPREDNISolone

[double chicken]

my dentist prescribed this to me because at night i clench my jaw so hard that I wake up with severe headaches / migraines.
it is 21 tablets at 4mg.

does anyone know anything about this med?

[goose]

It blocks blocks inflammation and is used in a wide variety of inflammatory diseases affecting many organs.

[naturalsux]

my dentist prescribed this to me because at night i clench my jaw so hard that I wake up with severe headaches / migraines.
it is 21 tablets at 4mg.

does anyone know anything about this med?

if thats the same stuff i had it kept me up like speed without the speed.

you take 5 the first day, 4 the 2nd, and so on.

[naturalsux]

i didnt like it.

[double chicken]

i didnt like it.

what were you taking it for?

[naturalsux]

what were you taking it for?

infection, i think. its been a few years.


is yours like i said 5 pills the 1st day,4 the 2nd, 3 the 3rd, and so on?

[double chicken]

infection, i think. its been a few years.


is yours like i said 5 pills the 1st day,4 the 2nd, 3 the 3rd, and so on?

yes.

[naturalsux]

yes.

good luck, i hope it doesnt keep you up.

[Dizz28]

That sucks, hope you weren't on cycle or even go to the gym while taking it. That stuff causes protein catabolism. Why didn't he jus prescribe you a muscle relaxer?

[cj1capp]

my dentist prescribed this to me because at night i clench my jaw so hard that I wake up with severe headaches / migraines.
it is 21 tablets at 4mg.

does anyone know anything about this med?

thats normal tell your and see if he can change you to something else



Why is Methylprednisolone prescribed?

Feedback for Methylprednisolone
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Compare with other drugs.

Medrol, a corticosteroid drug, is used to reduce inflammation and improve symptoms in a variety of disorders, including rheumatoid arthritis, acute gouty arthritis, and severe cases of asthma. Medrol may be given to people to treat primary or secondary adrenal cortex insufficiency (inability of the adrenal gland to produce sufficient hormone). It is also given to help treat the following disorders:

Severe allergic conditions (including drug-induced allergic states)
Blood disorders (leukemia and various anemias)
Certain cancers (along with other drugs)
Skin diseases (including severe psoriasis)
Connective tissue diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus
Digestive tract diseases such as ulcerative colitis
High serum levels of calcium associated with cancer
Fluid retention due to nephrotic syndrome (a condition in which damage to the kidney causes loss of protein in urine)
Various eye diseases
Lung diseases such as tuberculosis
Worsening of multiple sclerosis
Most important fact about Methylprednisolone
Medrol lowers your resistance to infections and can make them harder to treat. Medrol may also mask some of the signs of an infection, making it difficult for your doctor to diagnose the actual problem.
How should you take Methylprednisolone?
Take Medrol exactly as prescribed. It can be taken every day or every other day, depending on the condition being treated.
Do not abruptly stop taking Medrol without checking with your doctor. If you have been using Medrol for a long time, the dose should be reduced gradually.
Medrol may cause stomach upset. Take Medrol with meals or snacks.
--If you miss a dose...
If you take your dose once a day, take it as soon as you remember. Then go back to your regular schedule. If you don't remember until the next day, skip the one you missed. Do not take 2 doses at once.
If you take it several times a day, take it as soon as you remember. Then go back to your regular schedule. If you don't remember until your next dose, double the dose you take.
If you take your dose every other day, and you remember it the same morning, take it as soon as you remember and go back to your regular schedule. If you don't remember until the afternoon, do not take it until the following morning, then skip a day and go back to your regular schedule.
--Storage instructions...
Store at room temperature.
What side effects may occur?
Side effects cannot be anticipated. If any develop or change in intensity, tell your doctor immediately. Only your doctor can determine whether it is safe for you to continue taking Medrol.
More common side effects may include:
Abdominal swelling, allergic reactions, bone fractures, bruising, congestive heart failure, cataracts, convulsions, Cushingoid symptoms (moon face, weight gain, high blood pressure, emotional disturbances, growth of facial hair in women), face redness, fluid and salt retention, headache, high blood pressure, increased eye pressure, increased sweating, increase in amounts of insulin or hypoglycemic medications needed, inflammation of the pancreas, irregular menstruation, muscle wasting and weakness, osteoporosis, poor healing of wounds, protruding eyes, stomach ulcer, suppression of growth in children, symptoms of diabetes, thin, fragile skin, tiny red or purplish spots on the skin, vertigo
Why should Methylprednisolone not be prescribed?
Medrol should not be used if you have a fungal infection or if you are sensitive to or allergic to steroids (corticosteroids).
Special warnings about Methylprednisolone
The 24-milligram Medrol tablet contains FD&C Yellow No. 5 (tartrazine), which has caused allergic reactions (including asthma) in some people. Although this is rare, it is more common in people who are sensitive to aspirin.
Medrol can alter the way your body responds to unusual stress. If you are injured, need surgery, or develop an acute illness, inform your doctor. Your dosage may need to be increased.
You should avoid immunization shots with live or live, attenuated vaccines while taking high doses of Medrol, because Medrol can suppress the immune system. Immunization with killed or inactivated vaccines is safe, but may have diminished effect.
Long-term use of Medrol may cause cataracts, glaucoma (increased eye pressure), and eye infections.
Large doses of Medrol may cause high blood pressure, salt and water retention, and potassium and calcium loss. It may be necessary to restrict your salt intake and take a potassium supplement.
Medrol may reactivate dormant cases of tuberculosis. If you have inactive tuberculosis and must take Medrol for an extended period of time, your doctor will prescribe anti-TB medication as well.
Medrol should be used cautiously if you have an underactive thyroid, liver cirrhosis, or herpes simplex (virus) infection of the eye.
This medication may aggravate existing emotional problems or cause new ones. You may experience euphoria (an exaggerated sense of well-being) and difficulty sleeping, mood swings, or mental problems. If you have any changes in mood, contact your doctor.
People taking corticosteroids, such as Medrol, have developed Kaposi's sarcoma, a form of cancer.
Medrol should also be taken with caution if you have any of the following conditions:

Diverticulitis or other inflammatory conditions of the intestine
High blood pressure
Certain kidney diseases
Active or dormant peptic ulcer
Myasthenia gravis (a muscle weakness disorder)
Osteoporosis (brittle bones)
Threadworm
Ulcerative colitis with impending danger of infection
Long-term use of Medrol can slow the growth and development of infants and children.
Use aspirin cautiously with Medrol if you have a blood-clotting disorder.
Avoid exposure to chickenpox and measles.

[BrokenBricks]

Here is the bottom line....it is *bad* for a weightlifter. It will make you fat and you will lose muscle. You ought to think of all of the immunosupresive steroids...prednisone, methylprednisolone, dexamethasone, cortisone, hydrocortisone...they are a class of drug called synthetic glucocorticoids...you body has a natural glucocorticoid product called cortisol...you should be familiar with it. These are just more potent versions of cortisol...they are *steroids* because they are built from cholesterol.



Below is the drug you are taking:



And here is testosterone:



Im sure its obvious visually they all have something in common, hence the common term "steroid". But the word describes their common precursor, not their function. So you modify the term with other words to communicate their function. Sex steroids like test, DHT, estrogens and progestagens all regulate sexual devolopent and function...but can be either anabolic like test...or not, like estrogens. Mineralcorticoids are not catabolic or anabolic, they are hormones like aldosterone which regulate the water re absorption from your kidneys. Glucocorticoids suppress the immune system (given to transplant patients to prevent tissue rejection) and therefore lower inflammation (so useful in inflammatory diseases like lupus and arthritis...or any time inflammation is a serious concern unrelated to an infection.


What you think you have is called "Bruxism" and it there is no role that I know of for steroids in its treatment. You can diagnose the disorder with a dental exam looking for signs of enamel wear and a history from the patient. This is easily treated with reducing caffeine and stimulants in adults, and if needed wearing a special dental appliance which is essentially a mouth guard.

What your dentist thinks you have is TMJ, an acute inflammation of your jaw joint. Oral steroids is a sketchy way to go about treating this disorder if that is indeed what you have. A non steroidal anti inflammatory like Motrin, Advil (basically all the over the counter pain meds but tylenol) would be the first thing to try as well as counseling on reducing unhealty jaw movements during the day.

In any case...its no good....but a few days of a catabolic steroid wont do anything noticeable to your body but reduce inflammation. I would forget about the effects on your body building and probe your doc for a clear diagnosis.

[double chicken]

Here is the bottom line....it is *bad* for a weightlifter. It will make you fat and you will lose muscle. You ought to think of all of the immunosupresive steroids...prednisone, methylprednisolone, dexamethasone, cortisone, hydrocortisone...they are a class of drug called synthetic glucocorticoids...you body has a natural glucocorticoid product called cortisol...you should be familiar with it. These are just more potent versions of cortisol...they are *steroids* because they are built from cholesterol.



Below is the drug you are taking:



And here is testosterone:



Im sure its obvious visually they all have something in common, hence the common term "steroid". But the word describes their common precursor, not their function. So you modify the term with other words to communicate their function. Sex steroids like test, DHT, estrogens and progestagens all regulate sexual devolopent and function...but can be either anabolic like test...or not, like estrogens. Mineralcorticoids are not catabolic or anabolic, they are hormones like aldosterone which regulate the water re absorption from your kidneys. Glucocorticoids suppress the immune system (given to transplant patients to prevent tissue rejection) and therefore lower inflammation (so useful in inflammatory diseases like lupus and arthritis...or any time inflammation is a serious concern unrelated to an infection.


What you think you have is called "Bruxism" and it there is no role that I know of for steroids in its treatment. You can diagnose the disorder with a dental exam looking for signs of enamel wear and a history from the patient. This is easily treated with reducing caffeine and stimulants in adults, and if needed wearing a special dental appliance which is essentially a mouth guard.

What your dentist thinks you have is TMJ, an acute inflammation of your jaw joint. Oral steroids is a sketchy way to go about treating this disorder if that is indeed what you have. A non steroidal anti inflammatory like Motrin, Advil (basically all the over the counter pain meds but tylenol) would be the first thing to try as well as counseling on reducing unhealty jaw movements during the day.

In any case...its no good....but a few days of a catabolic steroid wont do anything noticeable to your body but reduce inflammation. I would forget about the effects on your body building and probe your doc for a clear diagnosis.

wow, i appreciate that you would spend that much time answering my question. i will not take this medication.
I Do wear a mouth price to bed at night. it is especially designed so that your back teeth can not put pressue on each. only the front teeth. after breaking 6 of them do to heavy clenching and grinding my dentist ordered a special one made in a lab that I should not be able to break. i also take 1 cyclobenzaprine and 3 excedrine tension headache pills before i go to bed. i still get severe knotting in my upper back and neck which leads to migranes (sometimes vomitting).

[Dizz28]

wow, i appreciate that you would spend that much time answering my question. i will not take this medication.
I Do wear a mouth price to bed at night. it is especially designed so that your back teeth can not put pressue on each. only the front teeth. after breaking 6 of them do to heavy clenching and grinding my dentist ordered a special one made in a lab that I should not be able to break. i also take 1 cyclobenzaprine and 3 excedrine tension headache pills before i go to bed. i still get severe knotting in my upper back and neck which leads to migranes (sometimes vomitting).

So the flexeril doesn't work for you? ...or it does? how many mg do you take?

Does the Excedrine tension have caffiene in it? I know the Exc. Migraine does.. just wondering

[double chicken]

So the flexeril doesn't work for you? ...or it does? how many mg do you take?

Does the Excedrine tension have caffiene in it? I know the Exc. Migraine does.. just wondering

10 mg flexeril and yes there is caffiene in the excedrine.
These pills have with out a doubt helped my situation. If i dont take them I am definitly waking up with at least a very mild headache and stiff neck. when i do take them then i only wake up with a headache roughly 2 days a week. But no matter what i am waking up with muscle knots in my upper back and sometimes neck in varying degrees of pain.

after a night of drinking i am absolutley done for. I wake up with a headache that is at least a 5 on a 10 scale.

[BrokenBricks]

My apologies to the dentist...I didn't realize you were on NSAIDs, muscle relaxers and a dental appliance and *still* having issues....I am med school trained not dental school trained...a case as bad as yours is beyond me. I will say that 10mg flexaril once a day is not much at all...I would prescribe it at 10mg 3 times a day for general mechanical low back pain and related conditions where steady muscle relaxation is desired. Maybe your dentist is thinking that since you only experience the grinding at night that only dosing at night is sufficient.

There is nothing wrong with that thinking except that you need knowledge of the half life of the medication to achieve a night time blood level with a once daily dose that is equivalent to a 3 times daily dose (the standard).
If the drugs half life was 4 hours you would, at 10pm, have near the same level of the drug in your system if you just one pill at 8pm as you would if you took a pill three times a day, with the last pill at 8pm.

If on the the other hand the half lie is 16-18 hours (and it *is*)...there is a very large difference between the level of medication in your blood at night with once daily dosing vs three times daily dosing. You would need in the realm of double the amount as a single night time dose to achieve the effect that a three times daily dose would give at night.

Flexeril is abused commonly...and you already admit to drinking ( a bad idea with a muscle relaxer)...he might be wary of prescribing it at all, much less increasing your dose further.

[naturalsux]

My apologies to the dentist...I didn't realize you were on NSAIDs, muscle relaxers and a dental appliance and *still* having issues....I am med school trained not dental school trained...a case as bad as yours is beyond me. I will say that 10mg flexaril once a day is not much at all...I would prescribe it at 10mg 3 times a day for general mechanical low back pain and related conditions where steady muscle relaxation is desired. Maybe your dentist is thinking that since you only experience the grinding at night that only dosing at night is sufficient.

There is nothing wrong with that thinking except that you need knowledge of the half life of the medication to achieve a night time blood level with a once daily dose that is equivalent to a 3 times daily dose (the standard).
If the drugs half life was 4 hours you would, at 10pm, have near the same level of the drug in your system if you just one pill at 8pm as you would if you took a pill three times a day, with the last pill at 8pm.

If on the the other hand the half lie is 16-18 hours (and it *is*)...there is a very large difference between the level of medication in your blood at night with once daily dosing vs three times daily dosing. You would need in the realm of double the amount as a single night time dose to achieve the effect that a three times daily dose would give at night.

Flexeril is abused commonly...and you already admit to drinking ( a bad idea with a muscle relaxer)...he might be wary of prescribing it at all, much less increasing your dose further.

what about carisoprodol, since flexeril is so weak.

[BrokenBricks]

Carisoprodol, trade name (and street name) Soma is a a muscle relaxer, but is typicaly prescribed in cases of chronic pain especially when that pain is related to muscle spams. This is because the drug potentiates opioid receptors. This means that a given amount of Lortab or Vicodin goes much farther to relieve pain when used in combination with Soma. Personally, I would be very wary of prescribing Soma. It is known amongst the neurologists frequently asked to treat these chronic pain patients as one third of the pill abuser preferred cocktail. They like their Soma, Vicodin and Valium and boy to they get high with it. I mention this because it is highly abusable, more so than a more common muscle relaxer like flexaril, and anyone with a DEA# who can legally write for it knows it. That isn't to say you can't find someone who *will* write for it, far from it. But I can't picture a dentist writing for Soma.

The problem is not that Flexaril is weak, its not. Its only that his dosage is lower than the standard dose given. I wouldn't presume to know more than a dentist about managing bruxism however and maybe that dose is typical for that indication. In any event it is very unlikely he will be given Soma.

[double chicken]

My apologies to the dentist...I didn't realize you were on NSAIDs, muscle relaxers and a dental appliance and *still* having issues....I am med school trained not dental school trained...a case as bad as yours is beyond me. I will say that 10mg flexaril once a day is not much at all...I would prescribe it at 10mg 3 times a day for general mechanical low back pain and related conditions where steady muscle relaxation is desired. Maybe your dentist is thinking that since you only experience the grinding at night that only dosing at night is sufficient.

There is nothing wrong with that thinking except that you need knowledge of the half life of the medication to achieve a night time blood level with a once daily dose that is equivalent to a 3 times daily dose (the standard).
If the drugs half life was 4 hours you would, at 10pm, have near the same level of the drug in your system if you just one pill at 8pm as you would if you took a pill three times a day, with the last pill at 8pm.

If on the the other hand the half lie is 16-18 hours (and it *is*)...there is a very large difference between the level of medication in your blood at night with once daily dosing vs three times daily dosing. You would need in the realm of double the amount as a single night time dose to achieve the effect that a three times daily dose would give at night.

Flexeril is abused commonly...and you already admit to drinking ( a bad idea with a muscle relaxer)...he might be wary of prescribing it at all, much less increasing your dose further.

yeah, i drink pretty hard once a week Friday or Saturday night, it is a good for stress relief.
any other ideas on things i might try?

[naturalsux]

Carisoprodol, trade name (and street name) Soma is a a muscle relaxer, but is typicaly prescribed in cases of chronic pain especially when that pain is related to muscle spams. This is because the drug potentiates opioid receptors. This means that a given amount of Lortab or Vicodin goes much farther to relieve pain when used in combination with Soma. Personally, I would be very wary of prescribing Soma. It is known amongst the neurologists frequently asked to treat these chronic pain patients as one third of the pill abuser preferred cocktail. They like their Soma, Vicodin and Valium and boy to they get high with it. I mention this because it is highly abusable, more so than a more common muscle relaxer like flexaril, and anyone with a DEA# who can legally write for it knows it. That isn't to say you can't find someone who *will* write for it, far from it. But I can't picture a dentist writing for Soma.

The problem is not that Flexaril is weak, its not. Its only that his dosage is lower than the standard dose given. I wouldn't presume to know more than a dentist about managing bruxism however and maybe that dose is typical for that indication. In any event it is very unlikely he will be given Soma.

i couldnt agree with you more. just suggested since he has some serious problems. waking up during the night from muscle knotting, migraines, and breaking teeth is some serious shit.

[BrokenBricks]

yeah, i drink pretty hard once a week Friday or Saturday night, it is a good for stress relief.
any other ideas on things i might try?

I'm sorry, it is beyond my training. I can only say that when you meet you dentist to press him to be as open and descriptive as possible regarding his plan for your treatment. If you are fitted with a durable guard, the damage to your teeth will be eliminated. The secondary effect, these headaches, will be a challenge to manage, but if your dentists plan sounds reasonable to you and you have no reason to think he is doing something other than the standard of care for your condition (and nothing I have heard indicates that) I would trust him. It doesn't hurt to go to another dentist with a detailed description of your history dealing with this, including the different treatments tried and see if the dentist feels that those treatments were reasonable first steps. That doesn't mean change dentists, only to get a fresh look on your issue and see what he/she thinks.

[double chicken]

I'm sorry, it is beyond my training. I can only say that when you meet you dentist to press him to be as open and descriptive as possible regarding his plan for your treatment. If you are fitted with a durable guard, the damage to your teeth will be eliminated. The secondary effect, these headaches, will be a challenge to manage, but if your dentists plan sounds reasonable to you and you have no reason to think he is doing something other than the standard of care for your condition (and nothing I have heard indicates that) I would trust him. It doesn't hurt to go to another dentist with a detailed description of your history dealing with this, including the different treatments tried and see if the dentist feels that those treatments were reasonable first steps. That doesn't mean change dentists, only to get a fresh look on your issue and see what he/she thinks.

Thanks for your time.