Doxycycline - Safe to take while in remission?

[whiteblur]

I have experienced prednisone acne and my dermatologist wants to know if I feel comfortable with taking doxycycline to help with some of the acne. My GI said that there is nothing that the dermatologist can give me that would cause issues with my crohns, i find that hard to believe. It would be a 40mg a day dosage.

Any thoughts?

 

[nogutsnoglory]

Any antibiotic can aggravate your crohns. If you take it ask if you can also have florastor with it to prevent c-diff.

 

[whiteblur]

Is that a prescription probiotic? What is c-diff?

 

[nogutsnoglory]

No its over the counter in any. Pharmacy. C-diff is a bacteria and highly contagious and dangerous that can occur when antibiotics upset the balance of your gut.

 

[wild_one353]

hell no, its been linked to causing crohns by harming gut bacteria. i took 3-4 courses before developing crohns and may have set me up, last blow was augmentin, no going back at this point.

do a google search you the study somewhere on doxy crohn's link.

 

[SupportiveMom]

Interesting because my kid is being put on a combination of Doxycycline, Vancomycin, & Metronidazole for treatment of crohns. We have added Florastor to it and she starts treatment Sunday.

 

[baistuff]

I usually have a principle that I try to avoid using meds for the sole purpose of treating a side effect from another med.

Besides crohn's flares, ANY antibiotic can cause C diff, and C diff is much more common in IBD patients than non IBD patients. There are also plenty of strong topical acne meds. It is not my place to tell anyone here what to do, but I think my drift is pretty clear.

Doxycline can also cause, nausea, skin reactions when exposed to the sun for more than several minutes, and can cause inflammation of the esophagus.

 

[nogutsnoglory]

Doryx which is the brand of doxy is supposed to be delayed release and easier on the stomach. Insurance could be forced to cover this given your stomach problems with IBD

 

[kiny]

I wouldn't either. We still don't know how dysbiosis affects crohn's disease, and catching c diff is rather easy in hospitals.

They do use antibiotics to treat crohn's disease, but they tend to be more specific and they are macrophage penetrating like cipro and flagyl with some specificity, they're a very different type than Doxycycline. Cipro might be effective against invasive E coli, there is some thought behind why you would want to use cirpro to treat crohn's disease, it's good at killing intracellular gram negative bacteria.

But it's possible that other antibotics like Doxy might make CD worse, since they would worsen dysbiosis.

 

[nogutsnoglory]

What about taking it with probiotics and florastor? I'm likely going on this next week but only for a few weeks. Wouldn't risk it long term.

 

[Tesscorm]

I've also read of a connection with crohns. This was prescribed to my son a while ago for the prevention of malaria when he was travelling. At the time, while his GI didn't say an absolute 'no' to the doxy, he didn't think the malaria risk was great enough to necessitate the doxy - so we chose to skip it.

However, if it's a treatment you do need, like all the other meds, you need to weigh the risk/reward. :ghug: And, if you do use it, perhaps ask if you can offset some of the risk with probiotics, etc.

 

[northwesterner]

I've also read of a connection with crohns. This was prescribed to my son a while ago for the prevention of malaria when he was travelling. At the time, while his GI didn't say an absolute 'no' to the doxy, he didn't think the malaria risk was great enough to necessitate the doxy - so we chose to skip it.

I was trying to figure out why this was so familiar.... I've taken it for malaria prevention. No IBD side effects. It is one of the two most effective malaria prophylactics available (the other being malarone which is very expensive) so if you do any amount of traveling, you may have to take it. Another downside is that you must continue treatment for 30-days once you have left the malaral area.

I no longer take it when I travel to SE Asia. The risk of malaria, while present in many areas (Laos, Cambodia, Burma) is relatively low. I cover up and spray during the mosquito active hours and haven't had so much as a bite.

On the other hand, if I was going to a malarial region in Africa, I'd take it.

 

[nogutsnoglory]

It's been a week and wrecking havoc on my stomach. More diarrhea and nausea. I dont know how im gonna do this for a month.

 

[nogutsnoglory]

So happy to be done with the doxy. Made my depression much worse too and aggravated my gut flora. Now onto high dose probiotics and hoping it proved useful in fixing my body.