Got gout?

[hermetic]

I do, dammit! It came a surprise as I am a woman, not overweight and I gave up red meat 10 years ago. Then I woke up last weekend with the most horrible pain in my left foot and it was completely swollen. Got to the clinic for blood work and sure enough: gout. No more beer for me.

Today I started taking Colchicine which is supposed to clear it up right away. For $8 a pill, it better. I just wondered if anyone else here had dealt with it so we could commiserate a bit.

[Warpy]

1. My mother had it

and refused to watch her diet so she was periodically on allopuinol and colchicine and whatever the NSAID du jour was, once they'd been invented.

A lot of people with gout can be diet controlled, and not the extreme form of the low purine diet reserved for acute attacks. Just avoiding super high purine foods will do it. Others will need to be on medication intermittently and a few will be on it for life.

[hermetic]

2. Thanks Warpy

That's what I'm hoping for, diet controlled but not extreme. I was just on the Arthritis Foundation website, reading about foods to avoid, and it's pretty depressing. Cheese and pasta are pretty essential to my diet. I hope I can get by with everything in moderation.

[catnhatnh]

3. Yup

During a bad outbreak you should ask your doctor if a prednisone taper is appropriate. Basically it's 10mg prednisone pills taken for 5 days-5-4-3-2-1 pill each day. I usually do that 2 or 3 times per year...