Pentasa - side effects worth it?

[Lis78]

I have mild crohns and have been on pentasa for a week. At first, my only side effect was fatigue, and everything else was working great. Over the weekend, everything changed for the worse: bad diarrhea, stomach pains, constant need to use the bathroom. The worst part is my stomach is making lots of noise at night, so I can't sleep. It was pretty much like I was having a bad flare-up. At this point, I'm wondering - why am I taking this medication if it makes things worse?

My question is will this get better? Is it just my body reacting to the new medicine and eventually it will get better? Because if this is part of pentasa, I'm going to talk to my doctor about switching meds.

 

[kh216]

I was on Pentasa and it did not help me at all. It sounds like to me that this medication is not effective for you either and that you need to switch your medication either. I personally did much better on Asacol for a few years and then it wasn't enough and I took 6mp along with it. Regular Asacol has been discontinued and I switched to Lialda,which is working fine with me.

 

[valleysangel92]

I only had pentasa for a short amount of time, and in that time I did have stomach cramps, I wasn't on it long enough to see if they went away.

Have you had any other medications for this flare or just pentasa?

Pentasa is one of the mildest drugs used to treat crohns, it has the least side effects and the least long term risks, not everyone gets on with it though, and due to it being so mild, some people find that it just isn't enough to bring a flare under control without the help of steroids or immunosuppressive medication.

A week isn't really a long time for medications to start to work, so don't give up on it completely without talking to your doctor, it may be that the medication was started just as the flare was getting worse, or that you need something a bit stronger to bring the flare under control and put you into remission.

 

[costina]

My doctor started me on pentasa when I was diagnosed in 2007 and it was terrible. On top of having to take 4 horse pills 4 times a day I was constantly on the toilet, in pain, and nauseated. Honey, switch the meds!!!