Just diagnosed with crohns how long does medicine take to work?

[bobby5]

Ive been sick for about 7 weeks now and just got out of the hospital for a week and they found out it is chronhns. They gave me some steroids through a iv while i was there now im on 100mg of predizone at home. Ive been on it a week and really dont feel any better. The doctor keeps on telling me intestines where so inflammed it will take a while. Its been a week and i really dont feel better and still have diarhiaa all through the night with stomach pain. Does it take a while to get the inflammtion down? What if the predizone doesnt work is there another medicne they can give me?

 

[NatalieMT]

For me I was using prednisolone for about 4 months before I felt okay-ish, I had been ill for many many months before that though and it was nice to feel some relief for a while.

I believe the time scale and treatment success really just depends on how your own disease responds though, 100mg is a pretty high dose though I have to say and I'm sure it's not comfortable for you right now. Has your doctor advised you on when and how to taper off the medication? That might give some indication of when they hope you will be in a better state.

Prednisolone isn't considered to be long term treatment for most, especially at high doses so I would imagine those treating you will want you to try other medications later on to get you into remission and as symptom free as possible. For as long as possible too!

 

[Maverick7]

Prednisone has a half life of 4 hours as i stated before but your doc is right, you might have so much inflamation it might take a bit to get it all under control. I start feeling the difference within a week and normally feel back to 100% within 2-3 weeks.

 

[Wizbit]

I concur with Maverick that improvement is felt within the first week of beginning Prednisolone treatment.

 

[My Butt Hurts]

Wow 100 mg is a high dose to be on. I am usually on 40 mg of pred. I usually start feeling better within a week too, once I remember specifically it was 4 days. That doesn't mean I felt totally healed, but started to feel better.
I am surprised that they don't have you on a maintenace drug too, but maybe they are waiting to see how you respond to the pred before deciding what else your body will need.
Welcome to the forum by the way.