I was just prescribed this by a doctor, but am scared by some of the horrid stories I’ve read. Seems that generally when you take Cipro for prostatitis, there’s some positive effect, and then everything comes back when you stop taking it.
Has anyone here had permanent resolution of prostatitis with Cipro? Probably not going to take it, but if there’s a possibility it could be a real solution, I would think of giving it a try.
Well I went to the emergency room last night and the doc there insisted I take a double dose of levaquin, which is in the same drug class as cipro. I don’t really feel any different than yesterday, but I noticed I have a bit of joint pain in my right knee. I wonder if this is not a cause for concern… seems as if this kind of pain does not go away for many people after they stop these quinolones. I think I might stop taking it, but I’m concerned that my prostatitis symptoms will only get worse…
Edit: Now I’m getting some weird feelings of pain in the joints of my fingers when typing. No more levaquin for me. Hopefully I haven’t caused any permanent damage with one 500mg dose.
I believe the pictures here explains what you need to know:
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1803142/figure/f1/
(from ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1803142/ )
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC89668/figure/F1/
(from ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC89668/ )
You must get a urine culture test to look for bacteria. Prostatitis is usually not caused by bacteria and you should stop taking an antibiotic immediately if your culture test comes back negative.
I would highly discourage you from using a Fluoroquinolone as an antibiotic choice. There are about 40 times more more fluoroquinolne adverse reaction victims on Facebook than Propecia victims, and Fluoroquinolone injuries last 6 months minimum (source ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2921747/pdf/jcad_3_4_49.pdf).
If you are going to take a Fluoroquinolone antibiotic, take a magnesium, N Acetylcysteine, and CoQ10 supplements in between the Fluoroquinolone doses.
References:
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1803142/
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19818344
Doxycycline or other tetracyclines work for bacterial prostatitis I believe, and are far safer. (netdoctor.co.uk/menshealth/facts/prostatitis.htm)
I’ve had several urine tests done over the last few months, including two in the last week. All came back negative. Had a urine culture back when this all began-- negative. Just had one done on Friday, and they will call me with the results, but it is likely negative as well.
Supposedly prostatic bacteria will not show up in a urine culture, but I’ve had trouble finding a uro willing to test a prostatic secretion. Every doctor I see just wants to throw antibiotics at me. I’m seeing a new guy next week who has good reviews on the internet, and who supposedly does prostate massages, which I am interested in.
I don’t believe my problem is bacterial either, but it’s gotten a hell of a lot worse the last 4 days after being steadily annoying for about 5 months. I wonder if this could possibly just be one of the “flare ups” I’ve heard about. I am not confident in this since just about everything health-related that has happened since this started has not gone away once it appeared. I cannot live like this. If necessary, I am willing to undertake the risk of prostate surgery if it will mean I can pee normally again. I don’t care if I’m impotent and incontinent because of it.
Why do we even have this stupid organ that can choke our urethras and become permanently inflamed so easily? If only it were as easy to remove as an appendix, I would have surgery ASAP and get it done with. Who needs tainted yellow semen anyhow.
Oh and I am never taking another dose of a quinolone. I can barely type on my keyboard today because my finger joints are aching. Thanks for the advice.
Edit: Holy ****. I am getting major aches and sensitivity in the joints of my finger and in my knees. I hope I haven’t ****ed myself again. One ****ing dose??? I probably wouldn’t have taken this **** but the nurse in the ER handed it to me with a glass of water.
It sounds like you are having an adverse reaction to the Fluoroquinolone with all the joint pains.
The package insert that comes with Levaquin says to stop taking it immediately if you have joint pain. You now have to stop taking it.
As for recovering from it, my recommendation is to take a supplement with calcium and magnesium, but don’t overdo it.
The higher levels of magnesium or calcium taken for the first week would be:
Magnesium 600-800 mg, days 1-7 only
Calcium 1000-1500, mg days 1-7 only
The reason for these is as you probably noticed in the article I already posted a link to ( ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1803142/ ), a lot of research has shown Fluoroquinolones collect in joints and they chelate magnesium, and the lesions they create in cartilage visually appear similar to those created by magnesium deficiency, so it seems like intracellular magnesium deficiency is one of the (numerous) mechanisms of damage to humans.
A word of caution about magnesium: it is mildly toxic at doses just above 1000 mg in healthy people. Those with kidney damage are more sensitive to it and should take less. The US RDA (Recommended Daily Allowance) is 420 mg. For minerals, it is common that the Tolerable Upper Limit (the maximum amount you should intake) is only a few times higher than the RDA. A healthy diet usually gets you your RDA worth, that’s why multivitamins don’t need to add much minerals and why you’ll need to buy a special one for magnesium.
After the first 7 days, your joint pain symptoms will hopefully resolve like most people’s, so you won’t need to join another medication support group. If your symptoms resolve, just remember to not push yourself too hard in sports for the next few months to protect your tendons as tendon rupture can happen without any prior warning.
If your symptoms do not resolve, then you should add these supplements below, then join a support group such as health.groups.yahoo.com/group/fqtoxicity/
Supplement levels:
Performance Multivitamin with B vitamins higher than 100% RDA, content varies, until end of symptoms – Provides baseline nutrition
Magnesium, 400-500 mg, until end of symptoms – replaces depleted magnesium
Calcium, 500-750 mg, until end of symptoms – aids magnesium function
Vitamin D, 1000 IU, until end of symptoms – low in FQ victims and general population
N Acetyl Cysteine, 500 mg, until day 30 – replaces depleted glutathione and is anti-oxidant
Alpha Lipoic Acid, 400 mg, until day 60 – helps with neuropathy and is anti-oxidant
AC-11, 700 mg, until day 90 – aids healing DNA double strand breaks (fluoroquinolones cut DNA)
Probiotic with several cultures, varies, until day 90 – prevents overgrowth of bad bacteria
One more thing:
Over the next 2-3 months, be on the lookout for the following telltale symptoms of a worse Fluoroquinolone reaction:
Many more symptoms are associated with Fluoroquinolones and the mental symptoms are the same as for Finasteride, but one of the three above are present in every significant adverse reaction. Some of the most common other side effects are brain fog, anxiety attacks, insomnia, dry eye, eye light sensitivity, dizziness. And cold hands or feet – instead of your penis not getting blood flow (like Finasteride), it would be your hands or feet.
Cipro, just curious what brought you to this forum and your interest in it, given that you did not take a 5AR inhibitor? My guess is you did a keyword search and came upon threads on this forum of men mentioning cipro side effects?
Where I have been posting is only where I see people posting they are starting on fluoroquinolones and then in the next posts reporting new side effects that are textbook side effects of fluoroquinolones. In that case, I can post because I am well-schooled in those. When it comes to all the other topics, I can’t post because mechanisms of injury are likely different and I just wouldn’t be able to help.
I’m curious in reading the forums to see what mechanism of injury you are researching, and what medications work for the side effects that overlap with fluoroquinolones because you will naturally have thought outside our box. Then I can research whether they apply to our cases as well.
In this particular instance, I saw the poster reply to a different thread, then found him in this thread reporting new side effects after taking Levaquin and posting concern about them. That makes it legitimate for me to post.
Yes, I wasn’t questioning your knowledge, was simply curious how you came across this forum since you obviously took a different medication. I’m sure the poster and others on here appreciate your knowledge in this regard, as they are dealing with prostatis and other issues for which such meds are often prescribed.
I found the propeciasideeffects website first. I don’t remember how, but it probably involved a search for “low testosterone” along with other search terms.
Is low testosterone a side effect of Cipro or other fluoroquinolone drugs?
Do you have any insight into our post finasteride permanent side effects?
Thank you for all the advice ciprovictim. I am very glad I didn’t take a second dose on Sunday… in fact the only reason I didn’t was because the drug cost $220 for 10 pills w/o insurance! The doctor at the ER was one of these young hotshot doctors, and he told me levaquin would “knock that prostatitis right out.” I didn’t really believe him, but I thought with the way my prostate was acting that maybe there was an infection there. I asked him about other antibiotics, but he said that this was the only one powerful enough to do the job.
How do doctors not know about these things? I had asked my previous urologist about adverse effects from quinolones when they tried to prescribe me Cipro, and he acted like I was speaking a foreign language.
Also I should note that in an above post I said I took a “double dose” of Levaquin, but I’m not really sure what the standard dose is. They gave me 500mg in the form of 2 250mg tabs.
To cantsleep:
Emergency room doctors are the worst. Did he know anything about adverse reactions to Finasteride? They definitely don’t know what to do about adverse reactions to Fluoroquinolones.
As for complaints about susceptibility of the prostate to infection… if you were on a board that had women, you’d find out vaginas are more infection prone than prostates.
To Karzman:
Fluoroquinolone support groups have numerous low testosterone and near-impotence stories, but only one research paper on long term (clinically relevant) durations of Fluoroquinolones and testosterone has been published ( ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12479325 ) and demyelination of the optic nerve which causes blurriness in the center of vision in us and in Multiple Sclerosis. I’m not sure what you attribute yours to.
No the ER doc didn’t know about fin. But I can’t believe that urologists who prescribe stuff like Cipro and finasteride(proscar) on what I’m sure is an almost daily basis don’t know of these things.
One more thing-- I was thinking about your comparison of the number of Cipro vs Fin victims on social networking sites… that’s probably not a fair comparison, as Cipro likely gets prescribed far more often.
I don’t know of anyone here who has had permanent resolution in any form. There is one guy I read who had prostatitis while on finasteride and Cipro helped him, though the prostatitis would recur every few months. The prostatitis then abated completely over a couple months after he quit fin.
I too have burning in the perineum that runs down my thighs. In fact I actually feel it on the soles of my feet as well. Also my right nut has begun aching. This started a few days ago and is the worst pain I’ve felt since this all began about 5 months ago. When I originally crashed, I had an intermittent and dull perineal pain and some occasional tingling in my feet as well, but it then subsided for months and was only aggravated when I sat on my perineum the wrong way. Regardless, my urinary symptoms(difficulty starting stream, weak stream, incomplete bladder emptying) have persisted throughout, and have become far more severe in the last few days.
Urine tests will not show prostatic bacteria. You need to get your doc to take a prostatic secretion and culture it. Many uros are reluctant to do this because they will prescribe you antibiotics regardless of whether they find any bacteria. I am not sure either as to whether my prostate is actually infected. Our prostates could just be enlarged because of a hormonal imbalance. I took doxycycline for 2 weeks, followed by Bactrim for nearly a month, and saw zero improvement. By that same token, I’ve taken supplements like DIM and Chrysin as well, which are supposed to alter estrogen levels, and I’ve seen no improvement. My estradiol level was not high in my blood test.
Still trying to find a uro who will test prostatic fluid.
Just to update, all the joint aches and problems with levaquin went away after a couple of days. Guess I got lucky for once.
i was diagnosed prostatitis but now i have only one simptom recurrent
sense of pression in the lower belly
except this, nothing
i was cured with cipro and i got benefits
i have post finasteride problems, and my prostatite is probably finasteride dependent,
so maybe the pattern is different
I was prescribed Cipro to treat me for prostatitis, and it didn’t do anything at all to relieve my symptoms (i.e. the anal pain, etc). It did, however, make my knees hurt after about a month of usage, and I quit soon after that time (total time on the drug was six weeks) and the knee pain let up after a couple of additional weeks had passed. I’m sitting here with the anal pain as I type this…
How long did you take cipro?
What were the symptoms of your prostatitis that were cured by cipro?
i had feeling of very strong pressure that caused stiff penis in flaccid state, discomfort like
dumb pain and sensation that something was blocking the bloodflow at beginning of erection.
no necessity to urinate too much, no blood in sperm, no other classical symptoms
however labs tests found even some bacteria
after the cure (2 pills a day 500 for more than 1 month), the bacteria were eradicated and after months i have only recurrent little sense of pressure
yes i can’t say that was only cipro that cured me, i have taken a lot of integrators. i did also broc treat and i think was very effective too, however i still have to deal with other post fin sides