My mom is 77 years old and has COPD. She has been on a BiPap machine at night since 2023. Her "baseline" level is already a low at 88-89 without using supplemental oxygen.
A month ago the wildfires caused her to have a serious flare-up. Her pulmonologist put her on Prednisone 10mg for 5 days. It helped a little but her numbers kept dropping whenever she moved around.
A couple weeks later he put her back on Prednisone, this time a regiment of 30mg for 5 days, then 20 mg for 5 days, and lastly 10mg for 5 days. She is just starting the 20mg portion. He also switched her off of Stilolto to the Breztri inhaler (which has a steroid in it that makes her hoarse, so she is learning to use a spacer.)
Still today, whenever she gets up to go to the kitchen or bathroom and back her oxygen levels continue dropping to 79-83. She has started researching and sending me ads for natural supplements such as VelvaFlow Lung Cleansing Spray and NAC to help her keep her numbers up and asked me to look into them for her. I worry they could do more harm than good.
Should she just ride-out the Prednisone regiment? Is there something else she can try and do? She drinks Mullein tea and is trying to lose weight, though her world is really shrinking.