Colchicine for Gout - Part 1: Things to Talk About with Your Doctor - Some Need-to-Know Info!

[@dreynolds4883]

For some reason she makes me proud to be an Australian!

[@pharmacistfi]

Hi Danny Maiorana @dannymaiorana227 , Thank you for sharing your experience with gout, and sorry to hear it sounds like you have been going through a lot during the flare ups. As this channel is for general info about medicines, while I cannot advise what specific doses of medicines to take, I can tell you that the number of colchicine tablets per day which you mentioned is more than the current Australian Therapeutic Guidelines’ maximum number of colchicine tablets per 24 hours, so I recommend asking a doctor about modern, lower colchicine dose schedules to treat acute gout flares (which may be just as effective at reducing inflammation as older, higher dose schedules, but less likely to cause side effects). Also, colchicine side effects like diarrhea or vomiting may potentially be a sign of toxic effects on cells lining our intestines &/or liver, so it would be good to try to avoid them. Good to hear you are feeling ok on a urate-lowering medicine, and that you and your doctor are monitoring your uric acid level. I wonder if it might be of interest to know that uric acid level often drops down to target level during an acute gout flare (researchers are unsure why this happens, but my guess is that this might be because some of the uric acid has been removed from the blood to make gout urate crystals). So, it is important to check whether uric acid level is above target when we don’t have a flare - which can then be used to guide the doctor’s allopurinol dose selection for you, to gradually get the dose of allopurinol up to the specific personalized dose needed to bring your uric acid level down to target level and keep it there, so then the gout urate crystals can start to gradually melt (which might take 6 months or more if there are no tophi and uric acid target level is maintained, or might take 12 months or more if you have any tophi and uric acid target level is maintained). Then, once the gout urate crystals have all melted, continuing to maintain uric acid at target level life-long should then prevent gout flares from ever happening again. If you are not already taking a medicine to prevent gout flares, you could also ask a doctor about that, because most people need to take a medicine to prevent gout flares during the first 6 months or more of taking a urate-lowering medicine like allopurinol, because urate-lowering medicines like allopurinol increase our risk of gout flares early on (when they are melting gout urate crystals) via changes in our uric acid level, which may trigger gout flares. Once the gout urate crystals are all melted, gout flares should no longer be able to happen, as long as uric acid level is kept at target level - so gout urate crystals cannot be formed. I hope this info may be helpful, and that your treatment goes as well as possible. Here is a link to my ’10 Things You May Not Know About Gout’ series, in case some of the other new info there might be of interest to you. Best Fi :>

[@pharmacistfi]

Hi Mr Williams @bryanwilliams7697 , Thank you for sharing your experience with Colchicine - that is good to hear you have found it helpful. I recommend asking a doctor about the new treatment guidelines' shorter dose schedule for managing acute gout flares with colchicine, which has been designed to try to avoid the former protocols' toxicity side effects like nausea and diarrhoea, while enabling similar reduction of inflammation. I hope this info may be helpful for you. Best, Fi

[@duanesemmons2913]

i dont care bout side effects nothings worse than the big g

[@bonifronda8766]

⁰⁰ ok no hurry

[@pharmacistfi]

Hi Boni Fronda, Thanks for your feedback. Best, Fi