Which has worse side effects?

[ninjarambohd]

Hello everyone. I have a question. Which drug has worse side effects? Budesonide or Humira? I know both have side effects but if you were to choose to only use one of these drugs which would you choose? Which has worse side effects?

 

[ronroush7]

Personally, I was fine with both medicines.

 

[yellowamc]

I'm not sure on those 2 meds but have had side effects on 3 bios and loss of effect on all 3 stopped bios all together. Have gone back on Pentasa. Everyone is different and everyone has different ways of looking at the whole picture. For myself ive had 2 surgeries one taking 5 hrs to me to where everything would work again for lack if better terms. I have chosen to deal with symptoms as they come and go rather than feeling like crap all the time on meds and still have symptoms come and go. But again everyone is different and has opinions.

 

[Crispix73]

I didn’t have any side effects from budesonide any of the times I’ve taken it, and I don’t have any side effects from Humira while taking it now.

These are different drugs though. Budesonide isn’t necessarily used as a maintenance drug. It’s used more to treat flare ups when they happen. Humira is a maintenance drug and would be used regularly to, hopefully, prevent flare ups from happening and to control the disease.

 

[ninjarambohd]

I didn’t have any side effects from budesonide any of the times I’ve taken it, and I don’t have any side effects from Humira while taking it now.

These are different drugs though. Budesonide isn’t necessarily used as a maintenance drug. It’s used more to treat flare ups when they happen. Humira is a maintenance drug and would be used regularly to, hopefully, prevent flare ups from happening and to control the disease.

The thing is, I got some side effects from Humira after two uses so my doctor prescribed budesonide and said I can use it at 6 mg after a while for maintenence.

 

[Crispix73]

The thing is, I got some side effects from Humira after two uses so my doctor prescribed budesonide and said I can use it at 6 mg after a while for maintenence.

Gotcha. I never had any side effects from budesonide, and it worked really well for me while I was taking it. Good luck! I hope it works well for you and you don’t experience any side effects

 

[ninjarambohd]

Gotcha. I never had any side effects from budesonide, and it worked really well for me while I was taking it. Good luck! I hope it works well for you and you don’t experience any side effects

Thank you! I really hope so as well. After humira use I started to get psoriasis around my nose and bleeding gums. So hope budesonide works.

 

[Guerrero]

Budesonide is a corticosteroid, so it has plenty of nasty side effects.

Humira if taken under control is much safer in the longer term.

 

[my little penguin]

Budesonide Is still a steriod NOT to be used as a maintenance med
It still can cause adrenal insufficiency/Cushing/cateracts /glaucoma/diabetes/osteoporosis

Skin conditions like psoriasis can be unmasked by humira
It doesn’t cause them -even woth stopping the drug they may still be there
Psoriasis also is linked woth crohns so sometimes it just shows up on its own

There are other biologics including remicade and Stelara

Some docs add mtx to humira which stops the psoriasis
And increases the effectiveness of the humira

Regardless long term
Budesonide
Is not really an option

Tagging Maya142 and crohnsinct

 

[Maya142]

My daughter was on Entocort - Budesonide - for over a year. She had also been on Prednisone on and off for the previous 5 years. She developed Cushing's syndrome and adrenal insufficiency while on Entocort.

Cushing's syndrome means the puffy round steroid face, stretch marks, rapid weight gain.

As a 20 year old, you can imagine, she was NOT happy. There is nothing you can do about Cushing's syndrome except stop using steroids and wait for it to go away. It has been almost a year now and she still has the puffy round face and hasn't lost the steroid weight, despite trying very hard.

Then on top of that, she developed adrenal insufficiency. Your adrenal glands get so used to getting cortisol from an outside source that they stop producing it. They "go to sleep" as her endocrinologist explained it. They also do not produce any cortisol to compensate for any additional stresses on the body. For example, if you had a cold and a fever, normally your adrenal glands would produce extra cortisol. If you have adrenal insufficiency, they don't and you can go into adrenal crisis, which can be fatal.

Because of the adrenal insufficiency, she has to take hydrocortisone daily until her adrenal glands start functioning. If her body is under any stress - an illness, a procedure with sedation for example - we have to give her a stress dose, or she could go into adrenal crisis.

In addition to these side effects, low bone density, diabetes, glaucoma and increased risk of infection are common issues with long term steroids.

We never viewed Budesonide as a real steroid - we thought it was not as bad as Pred, and it isn't. But it still is a steroid and in the long-term, it can cause all these side effects. Her endocrinologist certainly counts it as a steroid and says it should be used for the shortest time possible.

If you had side effects with Humira, I would look at other biologics - there is Remicade, Cimzia, Entyvio, Stelara.

MTX is also an option and would work for the psoriasis.

Steroids should not be used as maintenance drugs.

 

[crohnsinct]

I echo everything that has been said about Budesonide being a steroid and not a maintenance drug. On top of that, it is not very effective. Our GI said it only works in about 40% of the cases.

My older daughter got severe psoriasis from Remicade. We added methotrexate to combat the psoriasis but it hasn't been very effective. In the end we chose to treat the psoriasis with topical as much as possible because Crohn's was the worse disease and we didn't want to drop a drug that worked on the Crohn's. Looks like my daughter is losing response to Remicade so we will be fixing to switch to Humira, Entyvio or Stelara. Studies show that in half the cases a switch in drug will help the psoriasis.

 

[Jelly loves Peanut butter]

I echo everything that has been said about Budesonide being a steroid and not a maintenance drug. On top of that, it is not very effective. Our GI said it only works in about 40% of the cases.

My older daughter got severe psoriasis from Remicade. We added methotrexate to combat the psoriasis but it hasn't been very effective. In the end we chose to treat the psoriasis with topical as much as possible because Crohn's was the worse disease and we didn't want to drop a drug that worked on the Crohn's. Looks like my daughter is losing response to Remicade so we will be fixing to switch to Humira, Entyvio or Stelara. Studies show that in half the cases a switch in drug will help the psoriasis.

Crohnsinct....how do you know your daughter is losing response to remicade? Is it through symptoms or blood work or both?

 

[crohnsinct]

Both and fecal calprotectin >2500.

When determining loss of response though it is more that you constantly have symptoms rather than symptoms appear after a certain amount of time after infusion. In those cases it is usually just that the schedule has to be shortened. However, O has symptoms everyday, even the day after infusion. Also, her Remicade levels are within therapeutic range (>5) so it is probably not a case of not enough Remicade in her body.

There are some people who just need higher trough levels though so we are trying to get her levels really high to see if that will make a difference. So far not so much.