Cyclosporine Therapy

What is cyclosporine therapy?

Cyclosporine is a medication which is expansively used by doctors and physicians worldwide to help lower the immune system in human body along with achieving numerous other benefits through this medicine. Numerous medical studies have proved that the cyclosporine therapy is not safe for the psoriasis patients nor is it considered safe for those patients who are suffering from an impaired immune system. Because of its adverse effects on the kidney from rather prolonged usage, psoriasis patients are usually advised to take the cyclosporine pill not more than twice daily. Acquiring a baseline skin evaluation becomes al the more important with cyclosporine treatment considering the fact that most psoriatic patients have undergone the phototherapy while the cyclosporine can alleviate the risks of skin cancer in them easily.

Usage of cyclosporine therapy:

The  therapy should be seen in the pretext of being a steroid treatment alternative. Its effects are satisfactorily low as compared to the side effects of systemic steroids. In patients with chronic inflammatory disease, cyclosporine treatment must be considered more effective due to these extremely low side effects. Before conducting the  therapy, the concerned patient must be tested for potential TB. In this regard, the blood pressure and blood tests should be carefully monitored every two weeks during the first three months of therapy. After that these tests must be conducted on a monthly basis. Certain medicines such as ciprofloxacin, erythromycin, amiodarone, antimalarials and various SSRI’s enhance the cyelosporine levels. Similarly, regular consumption of grapefruit may help in increasing the cyclosporine levels too.

After effect of cyclosporine therapy:

One of the most common complaints of the patients who are under cyclosporine therapy is that of increased blood pressure. This is a rather transitory issue because as the therapy approaches its end, the blood pressure restores to the state of normalcy. Apart from the high blood pressure, the other two more worrying side effects of cyclosporine therapy are hypertension and nephrotoxicity. Then there are some rather sparse yet equally concerning side effects of this therapy which might include fatigue, tremors and paresthesias. For dentists, two side effects of this therapy – gingival hyperplasia and transient perioral hyperesthesia – are of particular interest as their special proficiencies might be required to overcome these issues.

In animals (particularly the domestic ones), there is always a risk of yeast infections and bacterial diseases which is caused by the immunosuppressive effects of cyclosporine. Usually, through effective use of this treatment in pets, one could be quite assured of substantially decreased rate in secondary infections. Moreover, most patients have also been reported to develop the feeling of vomiting, diarrhea, and nausea after taking cyclosporine for a substantial period of time. Most patients had also complained of finding the empty shells of cyclosporine in their stool. In this case, there is no need to panic as the best part of cyclosporine would have been absorbed by the body already. These stomach-related issues from cyclosporine could easily be avoided if the medication is taken with proper meals but special care should be taken some highly toxic beverages such as grapefruit.

 

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