7+ Things To Avoid While Taking Prednisone

If you’re on prednisone, knowing what to avoid while taking prednisone is just as crucial as understanding how to take prednisone. This article will give you the things to avoid while taking prednisone, helping you navigate its use with fewer worries. You’ll learn why steering clear of certain foods, activities, and other medications can make a big difference in managing side effects and maintaining your health.

Watch My Best Video on YouTube of Things to Avoid Now !

I called it “7+ Things to Avoid,” but it’s not really going to be 7, it’ll actually be 11. “Seven” just sounds better, right? The reason I used the number Seven is because it starts with the letter “S” and all of the things I’m going to tell you to avoid with prednisone start with the letter “S.” If you want a complete, printable list of exactly what to avoid (25+ instead of just the top 11 in this article) while on prednisone, be sure to fill out the form and I’ll send it to you!

25+ Things To Avoid While On Prednisone

Discover which medications, vaccines, vitamins, supplements, and foods to avoid while on prednisone.

Top 11 Things to Avoid While Taking Prednisone

1. Smoking

The first thing to avoid while taking prednisone is Smoking. Since prednisone is causing immunosuppression in your body, smoking is even more harmful than it normally would be. So avoid smoking. In addition, smoking can worsen the possible osteoporosis caused by prednisone and we don’t want to do that. Plus, smoking can worsen the heart disease side effects caused by prednisone.

2. Shot of Alcohol

We want to avoid a Shot of alcohol while taking prednisone. Alcohol can worsen osteoporosis, and weight gain and it can worsen insomnia. Those are the three biggest side effects of prednisone and alcohol can make them all worse. Plus, alcohol makes it harder to recover your adrenal system after prednisone interferes with it.

3. Stimulant

Avoid Stimulants like caffeine. This isn’t a hard-and-fast, completely avoid-it-at-all-costs guidance. If you are using stimulants and you don’t absolutely need them to function throughout the day, it’s best to avoid them. Prednisone is pretty hard on your heart and caffeine can be hard on your heart, too. Definitely avoid the big sugary energy drinks while on prednisone. Avoiding caffeine in general is wise.

4. Shots

Next, avoid Shots, but not all of them. Only avoid the live vaccines. There aren’t a lot of vaccines that are live, most of them are killed completely and aren’t going to interfere much and so they’re okay to get. But the live vaccines, there are a few to know about that. You should be warned.

Live Vaccines to Avoid with Prednisone

Flu Nasal Spray (the shot is fine)
MMR
Chickenpox/Shingles
Other unique Live vaccines for travel

Avoid the nasal spray version of the flu vaccine. The injectable version of the flu shot is totally fine. I have a whole video in-depth all about whether or not to get the flu shot while on prednisone and the best timing.

Other shots that are live may include the MMR shot and chickenpox shot. Most people don’t need to worry about the chickenpox shot. A related shot to that is for shingles, because it’s actually the same virus that’s causing shingles and chickenpox, that’s usually given to adults who are over 50 who have a stable immune system. But if you are on prednisone, you don’t have a stable immune system.

Immunosuppression from Prednisone

This is the exact definition of immunosuppression from the CDC. They said:

Substantially immunosuppressive steroid dose is considered to be greater than or equal to two weeks of daily receipt of 20 milligrams or a two milligram per kilogram body weight of prednisone or equivalent.

What does that mean? If you’re taking 20 milligrams or more per day for two weeks or longer or the equivalent of that all squished together in one dose, then you’re considered immunosuppressed. And that’s when we need to be careful.

But here’s the deal with vaccines; the live vaccines you want to avoid. Other non-live vaccines you can get while on prednisone, but they may not work as well because your immune system is not working like it normally would.

You might not have as robust of an immune response as you were hoping for. You may need to be revaccinated after you stop taking prednisone. Talk to your doctor about the best way to proceed. But it’s okay to get shots that are non-live shots, which is most of them; they are are just fine.

5. NSAIDs

Avoid NSAIDs, which are Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs. These are over-the-counter medicines often used for pain and inflammation.

You’d want to avoid NSAIDs while taking prednisone because it’s actually a drug-drug interaction. Both NSAIDs and prednisone are affecting similar pathways in your body and it can lead to an increased risk of gastrointestinal bleeding, like bleeding in your gut. So avoid that.

But this is not black-and-white; it’s not a complete contraindication. Instead, talk to your doctor about whether or not to take NSAIDs with prednisone. And if the benefit of taking both outweighs your risk of having a gastrointestinal bleed, then that’s something you and your doctor can work out.

6. Sugar

Avoid Sugar. This is mostly because prednisone is a glucocorticoid. Prednisone affects how your body uses glucose; glucose meaning sugar. If we are eating simple sugars, candy, desserts, all the things you crave while on prednisone, it can be a problem.

This is because prednisone is interfering with the normal metabolism of sugar. If you consume simple sugars, you’re just increasing the risk of weight gain and diabetes while on prednisone. I have an in-depth video and blog all about which “Foods to Avoid While on Prednisone.” So check that out if you want to know more.

7. Salt

Another food type to avoid and that’s Salt or Sodium. This is because prednisone is causing us to retain salt. When we’re eating salt, that makes it even harder for our kidneys to get the proper balance of salt and water which can lead to water weight gain or water retention and swelling. It’s just a lot harder for your body to do its job and can increase your risk for high blood pressure and heart complications. Heart disease side effects are one of the top causes of death from prednisone.

8. Stress

Prednisone is mimicking your body’s naturally occurring hormone called cortisol. Cortisol is our stress hormone. It is secreted by your body in times of stress, to get you through those horrible stressful times such as famine or war. When you have extra stress, it’s taking an even greater toll on your body.

Doing what you can to decrease your stress while on prednisone is wise. Take a break! You’re taking a life-saving medication, it’s okay to give yourself a break, right? So that’s one type of stress.

9. Sports

Another type of stress is Sports. I mean extreme sports. Doing normal physical exercise is fine. I’m talking about marathons, Iron Man races, and triathlons. That is very depleting and stressful on your body.

We want to avoid these because when you take prednisone as a drug, you’re taking 10, 20, or even a hundred times your normal cortisol level. And when you’re throwing on an extreme exertion like extreme sports, that’s just a lot more toll on your body.

Prednisone causes muscle loss, and issues with the integrity of your skin and bones. You don’t want to put extra stress or exertion on your body while you’re taking prednisone, especially while you’re taking high doses of prednisone.

If you need to be continuing your athletic pursuits, definitely talk to your doctor about this. But I don’t recommend starting extreme sports while on prednisone. I can imagine someone takes prednisone and starts gaining weight and thinks, “Oh, I’ll run a marathon.” Don’t do that. That’s not a good idea. Don’t start an extreme sports habit while on prednisone. Your body is already going through enough. You don’t need to put it through that much more.

10. Sick People

Avoid Sick people while on prednisone. You don’t need to avoid the snotty little kid around the corner. You can go to social events. But what we are worried about is sicknesses that can lead to pneumonia because heart disease and pneumonia are the biggest leading causes of death in people who take prednisone. We don’t want to expose you to somebody who has pneumonia.

That could be influenza, which is why you should get your flu shot, and covid, which is why you should also have your COVID shot. You want to protect yourself from things that can cause pneumonia-like symptoms because you’re less likely to overcome pneumonia while on prednisone than if you otherwise were to get it when you aren’t on prednisone.

11. Supplements

I’m not saying avoid all supplements, I’m saying avoid certain supplements.

What Vitamins Should Not Be Taken With Prednisone?

1. Aluminum Hydroxide

The first supplement to avoid while on prednisone includes things containing aluminum hydroxide and magnesium hydroxide. These are often called antacids.

They did studies and it said some patients have shown as much as a 40% decrease in the prednisone bioavailability when code administered with aluminum magnesium hydroxide.

If you were to take 10 milligrams, you may only absorb six milligrams because 40% of it is being blocked by the aluminum hydroxide! What’s happening is aluminum hydroxide is an ion and it sucks the prednisone in and 40% of it’s just hiding, unavailable to be absorbed and used. The prednisone just goes straight through your gut and you never even get it into your body.

You can take aluminum hydroxide; you just need to be aware that you’re probably not absorbing almost half of the drug that you’re taking. Definitely talk to your doctor if you have to take aluminum hydroxide containing supplements.

2. Licorice Root

Licorice root, or the Latin Glycyrrhiza glabra, often an ingredient in adrenal support supplements, should be avoided while on prednisone.

The extract of licorice root was shown to decrease the elimination of prednisone in test tube studies. In addition, if you actually absorb the licorice, it has been shown to prolong prednisone activity, which can increase your prednisone side effects. Since prednisone is causing 150 or more side effects, you don’t want that! We want the prednisone to fall off normally and not prolong how miserable we feel on prednisone.

If you’re taking licorice, it might prevent the immune-modulating activity of the prednisone from even working. It might even be blocking the prednisone altogether. I do not recommend taking prednisone and licorice root-containing supplements. Sometimes they’re called adrenal support supplements. You just want to avoid those while on prednisone. Maybe after you stop, that’s a totally different story, but not while you’re on it. We want to let the prednisone do its job.

3. St. John’s Wort

St John’s wort is often used for people who have depression. I can see why someone might want to take it, because prednisone often causes depression and anxiety as a side effect, and many other mood changes as well. Someone might think, “I need a natural way to help me cope with the mood changes from prednisone.”

The problem is that St. John’s Wort causes lots of drug interactions. One of those is with the way your body breaks down prednisone in your liver. We do not want to interfere with the way prednisone is being broken down in your liver.

4. Calcium Alone

Avoid calcium alone. Calcium is being depleted by prednisone. When you take prednisone, your body is messing with the calcium system and it’s causing all sorts of changes to the way your body uses calcium. If you were to take calcium alone, it’s not really going to help your bones, even though that might be why you would take it.

What it might actually do is increase your risk for heart disease. If you only take the calcium, the calcium isn’t being told where to go. Calcium needs messengers, it needs signals to tell it to go: from the blood into the bone to build bone. If you’d only take the calcium, it just floats around in the blood and can be deposited in the blood vessels leading to hardening of the arteries.

In fact, they can do an ultrasound of the carotid artery to see how much calcium is deposited there. That’s a great test to see what your risk for heart disease and the progress of your heart disease. If there’s a lot of calcium deposited here, that’s bad news. We do not want the calcium floating around in the blood. That’s not our goal.

What needs to be added to Calcium?

Do not take calcium alone. Instead, take calcium with vitamin D. They did a study, an analysis of properly conducted trials, which concluded that supplementation with vitamin D and calcium was more effective than placebo or calcium alone in protecting against corticosteroid-induced osteoporosis. If you want to protect your bones against osteoporosis, you need at least vitamin D along with calcium.

The doctors who prescribed prednisone the most, who are called rheumatologists, came up with a guideline. They recommend 1000 milligrams of calcium and 400 to 800 international units of vitamin D per day in the prevention of osteoporosis.

Vitamin D isn’t the only thing you’re going to need though. You should also have vitamin K2 and magnesium to help drive that calcium into the bone to give those signals for bone strengthening.

What’s the best supplement for people on Prednisone?

What’s the best way to get all of those nutrients you need for building bones after taking prednisone?

I personally had to take prednisone and I have family members with osteoporosis. I did not want to have those risks. And I felt horrible while I was on prednisone.

All the side effects I was going through, I discovered that prednisone steals nutrients. Then I discovered that the nutrient depletion leads to side effects. The loss of calcium and vitamin D leads to the bone loss.

The loss of chromium leads to blood sugar issues, weight gain, and muscle loss. Check out all the nutrients that prednisone steals:

If we replenish the nutrients that prednisone depletes, such as chromium, calcium and vitamin D, we feel so much better because we’re giving our body the nutrients it needs while on prednisone.

Introducing Nutranize Zone

I invented a supplement, I call it Nutranize Zone. It’s the first and only supplement for people on prednisone and it gives back all of those nutrients you need.

Plus I found other supplement ingredients that I included to help counteract other side effects. Nutranize Zone is designed to help you avoid side effects. So just go to Amazon and you can get it today to help support your body while you’re taking prednisone.

Check Price and Purchase on Amazon

Feel Like Yourself Again

Replenish The Nutrients That Prednisone Depletes: A convenient way to replenish the nutrients that prednisone is depleting is by taking a supplement. Nutranize Zone is specifically designed to replenish those vital nutrients that prednisone is stealing.

If you’d like a printable list of the 25 or more things to avoid while on prednisone, just fill out the form below and I will send it to you free of charge. It includes all the things to avoid, with the Top 11 I covered in this article, plus even more things to avoid while taking prednisone.