Hi Anne,
I'm wondering if Hydrocortisone didn't so much give you the joint pain as perhaps it was because your dose of Hydrocortisone was a lower equivalent due to the potency difference from Dexamethasone and Pred. If the transistion dose particularly when changing to Hydrocortisone from one of the longer acting steroids is too low then I suspect that the extreme fatigue and joint pain would set in. The joint pain can certainly be an effect of adrenal insufficiency due to an insufficient dose or until the body adjusts.
Furthermore compared to Dexamethasone and Prednisolone, Hydrocortisone has zero anti inflammatory action. Therefore if you had an underlying joint condition it could have been masked by the anti inflammatory component of Dexamethasone or Prednisolone.
I have been considering trying Hydrocortisone after a lifetime of Prednisolone and have wondered these very same things, so I was interested to see your message. My concerns have been, will I get extremely fatigued if I change and will I get the joint/muscle pain. I know what both of these are like and certainly don't want to rush for it to happen again.
I don't know whether the theory behind my above reasoning is sound but I have thought that if I change then the transistion dose would be the tricky one to work out due to the potency differences.
