PMR and Turmeric Curumin

I found some turmeric chews at Walgreens that taste good a bit spicy. I have one on most days. The name brand seems to be Force Factor. I am having one now thanks for the reminder. Yum. I like to think they help but hard to sort out. Calcium and other vitamins are also important. B

I started turmeric after PMR when diagnosed with arthritis. 500 to 100 is a safe dosage. It can interact with
blood thinners. Take it with a meal.
Diet is also important so consider checking the Mediterranean diet as well. I was prescribed statin and CoQ10 to counter the increased cardiovascular risk we
have with systemic inflammation. These are both anti-
inflammatory as well. Vitamin D and calcium are also important.

Fresh turmeric, if you can find it, is better than pill form. I chop up about a tsp full and incorporate it into my morning smoothie along with black pepper (which makes it more accessible to your body). It's a bit spicy but I love it along with the blueberries and other healthy things I throw in there.

I’m taking liquid organic turmeric once a day. It is quite expensive and I can’t tell if it’s helping.

Being down to 5 mg after only 3 months must be something of a record. It's good if you can do it, but PMR usually lasts much longer, so tapering so quickly can easily lead to a flare-up of symptoms. Have you had regular blood tests to check CRP, ESR levels etc. I take lots of fresh turmeric and other low inflammatories like blue berries, olive oil, hemp seed oil, etc; I was on a low inflammatory all natural diet for 3 years prior to PMR hitting and it didn't help prevent it in any way. But it has certainly helped in limiting side-effects from the steroids, but not in reducing the amount of steroids my level of PMR needs. It's still quite high after 18 months. I can get the steroids down to 10 mg and keep the CRP normal, but dropping under 10 mg and CRP shoots back up again along with more pain.

I've only been on 5 mg of Prednisone for a few days. It doesn't mean I'm not in pain, especially in the mornings. I'm very sore and some mornings I can hardly get out of the chair. I know that this is not over for me and that I'll have flare ups again. I go in for blood tests again soon. This all came about because of an infection I had back in January and shortly after I was diagnosed with PMR. I can only hope that it won't become chronic. I can honestly say I have never experienced, in my life, the kind of pain I get when in a flare-up.

I guess it comes down to what you think of as chronic. Median time with PMR is close to 6 years, although 20% recover within 2 years.

If your current dose of 5 mg is enough to clear the current level of PMR inflammation so that your pain doesn't start increasing - from a build-up of PMR inflammation - you should be fine. If it isn't enough you should know about it from the pain levels within a week or so.

But there will always be some pain and stiffness - usually in the morning. The only time I was ever pain free was when the inflammation escalated in the hip girdle and thigh muscles to the extent I couldn't walk. I spent the day in hospital where they decided to give me 30 mg injection of steroids. Pain was gone in 2 hours and I was walking normally. They put me on 30 mg oral steroids for 3 days after that and the pain and stiffness stayed away during that period.

I googled the following question "does Turmeric interfere with prednisone?"-

Here is the result -
Turmeric can interfere with the metabolism of prednisone and decrease its effectiveness. While taking turmeric as a spice is safe when on prednisone, it is recommended to avoid turmeric supplements to ensure proper treatment.

All supplements need to be checked with all drugs for interaction. Soy can interfere with thyroid medications, etc - plenty of examples - they are real interactions and not always easy to identify. Supplements can help - but they need to be monitored just like your Rx drugs.

Proceed at your own risk - but you might want to discuss with your doctor to hear their perspective.

I've Googled it interactions before and did so just then. Nearly all the results I get say that there is not interaction between turmeric and prednisone. Dr Megan Milne is the only one I found that says there is an interaction. I don't think there is any actual risk as such. If the turmeric was interfering with the prednisone you would soon know from increased inflammation and pain.

No reports of interactions and not listed in drug interaction checkers. Both are best taken with food
preferably different times.