Hi Vicki,

 

I just recently saw my endo and asked her about my steroid dosage (prednisone) which is now at 7.5 mg (and has been that for a while) - I asked her if I should switch to hydrocortisone and she said it was my choice, but since I was having no real problems with prednisone (DEXA still looks great) - she siad it was a toss up - she did mention that HC is more physiologically similar to what are adrenals would produce, and that I would need to take it more frequently than prednisone.  She said that the equivalend dose of hydrocortisone(or HC as I call it) for a 7.5 mg daily dose of prednisone is 28 mg of HC.  Simply put 28mg HC = or roughly equals 7.5mg prednisone.  So maybe 25 mg HC is just a minute step down for him and could be equivalent to 6 or 6.5mg prednisone. 

 

Anyway,

 

I also asked her about my calcium.  She has kept my serum calcium levels at around 8.0 (which is slightly  below normal values) and I wondered why she was doing this.  She mentioned that the clinical recommendations are pointing towards this lower maintenance of serum calcium for hypoparathyroidism.  I guess I trust her since she is a young teaching doctor at OSU, but I'm aware that others on here have different care.  It could be that the answer is still unclear as the where to keep calcium levels.  I take 1200mg of calcium citrate per day and 0.75mcg of rocaltrol (the vit D that we need and don't produce to help absorb and use calcium) - My endo recommends that we try to find the lowest dose of Rocaltrol possible so that we minimize bone turnover and loss. 

 

So, I'm not sure If I helped any but thought I would give the information I recently received.

 

glad to hear the visit went well!

 

 

Julia