Originally Posted by mrsD

Was the steroid oral or inhaled?

Did you take other drugs while using it? Like antibiotics for bronchitis etc? Cipro, Levaquin, Avelox? These cause neuropathies.

Steroids taken in high dose orally can induce muscle weakness.
This may resolve when they are stopped. Steroids also reduce immune function so that viruses that are latent, sleeping in your body, may activate. Herpes Zoster--shingles is one that may occur and it causes alot of pain in the dorsal roots along the spine. If you had chicken pox as a child... you could have Zoster in your neck. Some blood work would reveal high titres of antibodies if active.

I had an reactivation of my old shingles down my arm this vacation in fact, due to the stress of going to the boonies with 2 cats etc. (I have a thread on PN about this). The pain was considerable. And I believe can be confused with other spinal pain ailments.

The steroids used to treat severe inflammation, typically are all generic now. Prednisone does not make any big bucks for Big Pharma anymore, unless you are using brand name Deltasone (Pfizer). The steroid inhalers are all brand name and very expensive and would be heavily detailed to pulminologists.