Hey All
has anyone actually broken a cycle with a pred taper?
Thanks
Anthony

Way, way back when I was still episodic, and it was the first time I used a taper. Since then: nada. Blessings. lance

Not sure what you mean by "broken a cycle."  I've done prednisone the last three cycles.  On a taper starting with 70mg the CHs totally stopped for the two week period, then cranked back up in full right after.  I think the cycle just extended longer on that one.  Did a taper this last one starting with 20mg.  For the two weeks I had probably 5-10 PF days, but on the days I had CHs I was getting 2-3.  Then after the taper I was getting hit up to 5X/day, which is very, very unusual for my cycle (episodic for over 30 years with only 1 or the odd 2 per day in cycle). 

I am convinced that for me, prednisone does more harm than good.  Sure, I get some PF days, but it's like the beast saves up and hits me hard when I'm done with the taper.  Not only do I get hit more, but I have more kip 9-10. 

I've decided I'm never doing prednisone again.  This cycle was the first time I tried O2 and had great results.  I was at 15lpm and could get complete relief in about 10-15 minutes, but had to stay on the O2 until 20-25 minutes.  I'm going to buy a regulator that will let me get up to 40 or 60 lpm for the next cycle as I've learned from the board that can abort a hit much quicker.  Trex works like magic for me, but you really have to be careful with using too much.  O2 for home, trex for work or when I'm out.

We are all different and react differently.  So, as they say, your results may vary. 

There is a small percentage of CH'ers for whom a prednisone taper will actually break a cycle. A doctor tried to do that with me in the early 80's. We did about 4 tapers, starting as high as 80 mg a day. Would totally stop the attacks, but as soon as I fell below 30 mg they came back.

Joe

Language always gets us in trouble!

Pred is presented in the medical literature as a method for rapidly stopping attacks--for the duration that we use it--not as a permanent ending of a cycle.

Next step: at the same time we are using Pred (and this for a relatively few days), we start one of the long term preventives, Verapamil being the most common one with a long, excellent record of effectiveness. At some point, we taper off it and, if the cycle has ended, so do the attacks; if the attacks resume, we go back on Verap and repeat this trial-and-error until we stop having attacks.