Prednisone vs. Uceris

After nearly a year in remission I'm starting to flare again. My GI wants to do a another colonoscopy to see what's going on. In the meantime she prescribed me Uceris (9mg). I've only taken Prednisone in the past, which is the worst, so many bad side effects. My GI says it should help calm things down without all the nasty side effects. Just wondering what people's experiences have been with Uceris and how well it works compared to Prednisone.

If you have mild to slightly moderate inflammation then Uceris is a good fit and might work well. However, Uceris is completely useless for severe inflammation as it just isn't strong enough to handle that (pred is best for severe inflammation).

Overall, uceris is a 90% topical medication with the same sort of delayed-release coating that's used for lialda/apriso/pentasa/asacol. Uceris is still 10% systematic and is the equivalent of being on a very, very low dosage of prednisone (like 10mgs or pred or less) and you might encounter a few of the milder and less annoying side effects from steroids (acne, slight irritability/bloating/increased-appetite, etc.). Much better than Pred which is 100% systematic and a lot more severe at higher doses (insomnia, night sweats, wild mood swings, insatiable appetite).

My experience with Uceris is it doesn't do anything and it's expensive as hell. I hope it helps you though.

The first time I took uceris, it worked okay. The following time, no results at all. I think uceris was able to keep things mild for me, but once things were beyond mild, moderate, it didn't help enough to seem like it was effective. For me, prednisone always worked within a few days, or worst case, about a week. If things are mild, uceris is a great option. If they are beyond that, you might need prednisone. Uceris is great because the side effects are much more tolerable.

I had surgery though, and the thought of taking either drug is laughable to me. I hope to never consider it, but who knows what the future holds.

The Wellbutrin is for high epinephrine levels. It mellows out my stress levels and my flight or fight reactions so it might inadvertently help with UC since stress and anxiety can trigger flares. I actually started before being diagnosed with UC.

Thanks for everybody's responses. Very helpful. Uceris is very expensive but the side effects of prednisone are so bad. I've only been taking the Uceris for a couples days. So far no side effects and my flare seems to be cooling off. Bleeding has reduced significantly; almost no blood for a day now. Hopefully we got in front of it before the flare got to bad 🤞🤞🤞

I did have positive effects flare wise from Uceris, but I was not side effect free. I had blood sugar issues on it just like Prednisone. It wasn't enough to be more than a couple of times, but I think if I was older and my pancreas was more worn out I might have more issues. I think what I am saying is that it is better than prednisone, but it is still a steroid, so don't get lulled into thinking it is perfectly safe long term. Glad things are improving already. I was also diagnosed with pancolitis in 2017. I would recommend looking at adding the next tier of medication as what you are on is likely not enough any more. If you do something like Biologics, it can take time, and it is miserable to get that started once your UC is out of control. At first I was resistant to the idea, but I wish I had gotten switched earlier. Without adding other meds, you very well may just start flaring back up when you stop the Uceris.