Prednisone users: muscle atrophy?

Hi gang!

Bandit continues to do well! I am just a wee bit concerned about his muscle weakness. He is losing muscle tone, but in all fairness, up until this week, he's been very inactive (but was a VERY active kitty prior).

He is on prednisone 2x daily and I wanted to get him back to 1 daily or none, but I am not sure if I want to drop it. I spoke to the vet and she said to drop just a half of one dose to see how he is (if he does have cancer, the prednisone is part of that treatment).

I'm sort of fighting between keeping the medication where it's at but my gut is telling me to try to drop it a bit.

For those who have cats that are elderly (Bandit is almost 17), what did you do to counter act the effects of long term prednisone use? He gets b-12 shots, but I'm not sure what other vitamins/minerals he might need. Will be asking the vet of course, but if any of you have tried something that works, that'd be great!

I am a human doctor, not a vet but any advice that I give you should be checked with a vet.  I am afraid that in humans - and probably cats - the only way to reduce muscle atrophy due to steroids is to reduce the dose of steroids, but in chronic use of steroids the atrophy may persist, even on a small dose of prednisone.  However in the elderly there are other causes of atrophy and inactivity and arthritis are high on the list.  Having said all this, it may be that if he continues to improve, he will tend to use his muscles more and this may develop the wasted muscles.

With best wishes,

Geoffrey

Thank you @Geoffrey  I'm having him get a check up this week--before he was ill, he was a very active, strong cat. He still is quite agile and has slowly become more active as he feels better. But, I am an over protective momma and am going to see if there is anything I can give him to help keep him strong. I know muscles atrophy when not used, so I'm wondering if it's because he was so inactive for a long time(four weeks give or take).

I did attempt to start to reduce his prednisone, but I chose to put him back to his normal dose. I don't think it's very high, but it's helping him with whatever is going on in him and that is the bigger issue. 

thanks again!

our elderly cat started having muscle wasting before he was started on pred.  the vets say it's due to kidney disease.  does bandit have kidney disease?

btw, we also just dropped HK's pred to 1/2 the dose he was getting.  so far, no downsides *fingers crossed*

I have a kitty that has been on a steroid for 5 1/2 years.  Mostly prednisolone, he was on dexamethesone when the vet couldn't get the pred.  I haven't noticed this with him yet.

my snick was on prednisone long term. our vet told me that the prednisone weakens the immune system/response, leaves them vulnerable to infections (like upper respiratory infections, and etc). so i gave my snick L-lysine twice daily, to help boost her immune system. my girl was incredibly easy to pill, so i gave her the lysine in pill form (cut into 4 pieces, for each dose), but my 3 (current) cats take lysine daily -- i use a pill cutter to chop up the pills into the proper dose, then use a pill crusher on each dose, and mix the (crushed pill) powder right into their canned cat food. you could also dissolve the lysine in a little water, then mix that into the wet food. i'm pretty sure that lysine has no taste to it, certainly not a bitter taste (like some medicines have).

Bandit's kidney's are fine, which is a good thing---but he had lost a bit of muscle tone as he'd gotten older, but was still very active. In fact, until recently. He was sick for quite awhile so I think that could do it too.

Thanks for the input folks!

maybe you could discuss possible (gentle) physical therapy type leg exercises that you could do with your boy at home, to help strengthen your Bandit's leg muscles, when you see the vet this week for his check up.

We hope Bandit is okay now.

I've never used predisone in animals. . .however, my doctor gave me a prescription of the stuff for very bad posion ivy and it caused a life threatening allergic reaction. Never again will I take predisone!

Bandit is doing well. He's tired a lot but after such a long battle with pancreatitis and likely other things going on inside him, I understand.

I'm holding off on taking him to the vet as he's getting tired of going. The vets have said as long as he's eating and bathroom habits are good and no obvious discomfort, to keep him at home. If he needs b-12, they will come to my home and give it to him. Normally I'd do it but he hates needles  

I am actually going to do some light physical therapy for him--but he is a rather active kitty---meaning he does wander around.

Something is making me wonder if he may be losing or has lost some of his eyesight. He seems to stare at things for a long time or look worried---which would explain why he prefers under the bed as it's comfortable. This leads me to wonder if he had a mild stroke or kitty TIA. I just keep reassuring him with a mothering voice and he purrs and looks happy. We had a really nice cuddle this afternoon and he stretched out next to me and his sister on the bed and we all cuddled and they both just purred away. <3 

Bandit update:

Went to the vet today and he was happily eating his fancy feast in his carrier  

I noticed last night, while we cuddled before I fell asleep, he had a rather odd lump on the bottom left eyelid. I looked at it and it looked like feline acne, but I know acne doesn't migrate to the eyelid. I could tell it was fairly raised, but did not bother him (other than me poking it). Wasnt' hot or look out of the ordinary, but I figured I wouldn't mess with it.

Vet looked at him and he has held his weight!! I'd taken him in at the beginning of the year as he'd dropped a TON of weight (likely due to mom and her kitten being here). He was 10 pds, and now he's at 12pds and has stayed there despite the pancreatitis. Fluid level was good, but we gave him subq fluids since I was there. He also got his b-12 and the vet looked at his eye and she said it looked like a cyst, which was my guess. We're going to keep an eye on it--it's too small to take a biopsy of.

The only concern I had was that she noticed a faint heart murmur. Can cats develop a heart murmur as the age?? He's NEVER had one in the 16 and a half yrs I've had him---I even got to listen to his heart to compare against Mom's kitty's heart murmur(her doll faced persian who passed last year.)

Aside from that, Bandit is doing very well and though he isn't quite the same hyper kitty he was, he's still my little snuggle bug and happy. He and his sister continue to do very well.

darkhorse321 said:

 
Bandit update:

Went to the vet today and he was happily eating his fancy feast in his carrier  

The only concern I had was that she noticed a faint heart murmur. Can cats develop a heart murmur as the age?? He's NEVER had one in the 16 and a half yrs I've had him---I even got to listen to his heart to compare against Mom's kitty's heart murmur(her doll faced persian who passed last year.)

Aside from that, Bandit is doing very well and though he isn't quite the same hyper kitty he was, he's still my little snuggle bug and happy. He and his sister continue to do very well.

Click to expand...

I am a human doctor, not a cat doctor and any advice that I give you about your cat should be checked with your vet.  However a heart murmur, in humans or cats, is usually caused by irregularities in the borders of heart valves causing a vibration as the blood passes through them.  The irregularities in the heart valves can be caused by disease (particularly in the young) or degeneration as time goes by - and  Bandit's heart valves have now been opening and closing for over 16 and a half years, which is a good age for a cat.  The valves are very likely to have some degree of fraying at the edges now and thus are causing the vibration that was heard as a murmur by your vet.   Incidentally I understand from my vet that the average cat lives 14 years. 

The significance of a murmur varies.  In the majority of cases it causes no problems and the animal (or the human) dies with  the murmur, not of it, but if the valve is narrowed or if it is leaking, then there is an extra strain on the heart muscle and heart failure can occur.  Your vet does not seem to have been disturbed by the murmur and probably neither should you be.  FWIW, I personally have been diagnosed with a heart murmur a few years ago.  It has caused me no problems in my age-reduced getting around and it is just a benign product of my aging.  Bandit's murmur is very likely to be the same - but you should check this with your vet .

With best wishes,

Geoffrey

Thank you Geoffry. She wasn't overly concerned and this is the first time out of all his vet visits it's been heard--she did say it was hard to determine because his heart was racing because he was scared.  

In all, he's doing well. I think he may have lost some vision or had a mini stroke as he's definitely acting different, but he still snuggles and cuddles and is happy. That's my main goal now

oldgloryrags88 said:

I've never used predisone in animals. . .however, my doctor gave me a prescription of the stuff for very bad posion ivy and it caused a life threatening allergic reaction. Never again will I take predisone!

Click to expand...

Actually prednisone can be used for allergies, therefore you were unlikely to have been allergic to the prednisone.  You were more likely to have been allergic to the excipient (non-prednisone material) in the tablet.    This varies from brand to brand.  If you ever were given prednisone again then you should change the brand.

With all best wishes,

Geoffrey