How to avoid next gout attack with short term medication treatment?
Posted , 6 users are following.
Hi Everyone
I am an acute gout sufferer, nowadays facing my 4th gout attack with the gap of one year. In my first two attacks I did not realize it was gout but my 3rd gout attack was very severe and therefore I diagnosed it was gout. I did not take proper medication to bring my serum uric acid values down in the range as they were making me sick. After one year(now) I got another sever attack in my right foot toe. Doctor had advised me to take febuxostat (uristat 40 mg tablets) once daily. I know these medicines are long term treatment. Can someone please give me an idea how long should I take this medication? How long after taking this medicine I will be able to control my uric acid levels with proper diet and exercise? I want to cure my gout naturally.
0 likes, 25 replies
rustygecko Hammi
Posted
I'm afraid research shows you will not be able to control your uric acid levels by diet and exercise. Vegans still get gout. A significant amount of the red meat we eat each day is the cells which die and are replaced. These produce uric acid the same as food eaten.
You may be able to reduce blood urate to below 6 to the point of not getting an attack. However for health you need it below 3.0. If not your blood vessels, kidneys and heart are being damaged, as well as increased chance of stroke and cancer.
Gout is not the disease - its a symptom of hyperuricemia. The cause of that is genes and age. Your kidneys just aren't working as well. To help them drink water.
Guest rustygecko
Posted
rustygecko talks a lot of informed sense and it's all in line with my 5 year experience of gout. This is very real advice that people should heed.
rustygecko Guest
Posted
A lot of the advice on here is along the lines of eat this herb or eat this tree bark and you'll be OK. They don't realise that hyperuricemia is the same as type 1 diabetes - it's a serious illness which will inevitably kill you unless you take treatment. Equally, it's like rheumatism in that the symptoms naturally wax and wane, so that any herb will appear to do some good as it will coincide with a reduction in symptoms. What they don't realise is that even without symptoms, if blood urate is not below 3, it's destroying your blood vessels, heart, kidneys, increasing chances of stroke and increasing cancer risk.
Not treating high blood urate is like a smoker thinking "I feel well, I won't get ill" : a decade down the road it will get you.
Hammi rustygecko
Posted
Hi Rustygecko
thanks for your advice. So you mean to say that accute gout and chronic gout both are treated the same way with bunch of medicines for rest of the life?
Hammi rustygecko
Posted
My lab report says that normal reference range for uric acid (serum) is between 3.4 to 7 mg/dl. how could you suggest it should be below 3?
rustygecko Hammi
Posted
The lab report is for normal healthy individuals. The fact that we have gout attacks shows that our kidneys are unable to keep up with a normal level of urate. By keeping it loser it means our kidneys just find it that bit easier.
The NICE guidelines for doctors are published online.
rustygecko Hammi
Posted
Acute gout could be caused by anything - put us in the desert with no water and we will all get it. Certain meds will cause it. The reason that gout is defined as a couple of attacks in 12 months is to avoid catching people who for example have been walking for hours on a hot summers day without water, after taking a load of aspirin.
Acute gout is simply the consequence of too high blood urate just breaking through into the symptoms such as podagra (big toe pain). However, the silent symptoms of inflammation all through the body continue, silently damaging us.
The management suggested by NICE is blood urate reduction to below 3 on a long term basis. The reason this is possible is the treatment is cheap (a few £ per year) and for most of us no side effects.
(Incidentally all the allopurinol is doing is breaking down the urate to a form more easily dealt with by kidneys. All other animals do this using uricase but humans lost the gene to do this so we are the only animal that can get gout.)
Hammi rustygecko
Posted
I believe that keeping urate levels below 5 for atleast 3 months continuously will disolve the accumulated MSU crystals in joints for people who suffer gout once every year. But that is again what I believe, I might be wrong.
rustygecko Hammi
Posted
You could well be right, but the advice by NICE of ❤️00 is I believe to stop long term inflammation throughout the body, not just to flush out the urate crystals.
rustygecko
Posted
No idea why my 300 has changed into a heart. Under 300 is the advice of NICE. My annual result last week was 3.4 and my GP has expressed concern and wants another test in 3 months to see if it has gone down, and if not she will increase the colchescine to 400 mg.