Message Number: YG9663 | New FHL Archives Search
From: Steve Austin
Date: 2001-12-31 13:28:00 UTC
Subject: prednisone liquid vs tablet

In order to answer your question we will need to know how
much in mg you are giving the ferret of the prednisone.
I am assuming by the amount you are giving, and the
cost that it is pediapred, or 5mg/5ml- so you are
giving about 1mg per day of pred. You have to look
at the bottle to see if I am right.
It will be the same amount if you switch to the pills,
and the tricky part will be getting the dose right, either
by breaking pills, or crushing and mixing ( which will
require a little figuring, if you crush 5mg and add 5ml of
water you will actually have something like 6ml when you
are done ( so 5mg/6ml ) meaning each ml is 0.8 mg of
prednisone. But if it isn't mixed well each time, you
may not get an even mixture. If you are giving to the
same ferret, it probably will even out, but if you are
dividing that mix between two, it may be one gets
more and the other less.

I know people use the tablets, they are definitely less
expensive, and I am sure it would work out since you
can give a little more or a little less of pred and not
be any big deal, plus if you don't get the blood sugars
where you want them you may be increasing the dose,
or decreasing,etc. Be careful if mixing with food, make
sure the ferret will eat the entire amount of food, if he
leaves some behind, you won't know how much
pred he actually took.

The cost of the prednisone you are giving sounds a little
high, if you are giving 1ml a day to each ferret, or
60ml a month is costing you $52, look around to other
pharmacies. There are also two or three preparations
of prednisilone- pediapred, prelone and orapred (?)
the prelone is 15mg per ml, so you are only going to
have to give 1/3 the amount for the same dose, it
is cheaper in the long run, but tastes worse, so may be
harder to give-but if you only have to give 0.15ml
twice a day or 0.3ml once a day it may be o.k., I wouldn't
buy the whole month worth, just a week, and see if they
will take it, since I ended up wearing it I switched to the
pediapred, had to give more, but she likes it. Another ferret
I was ferret sitting takes the prelone for me just fine.

Patty

>
> Questions...
> I've heard prednisone comes in tablets. I find
> that it's very easy to crush melatonin tablets
> and mix with chicken gravy for my 3 adrenals, I
> think I would prefer tablet form of prednisone as
> well.
>
> Is one form (tablet, liquid) of prednisone better
> than the other?
>
> Are the tablets cheaper than the liquid? The
> liquid is so expensive, it costs me about
> $52/month for Knucklehead and Thomas.
>
> What would the tablet dosage be for a ferret that
> currently receives 0.5cc liquid 2x daily?
>
> Would I give the tablet form 2x also?

>
> Thanks,
> Vicky Edinger
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