Gout Treatment

Gout Treatment

2 different gout treatments will be addressed:

  1. acute gout pain relief
  2. gout prevention

In order to prevent joints disabled through gout tophi, you need to follow preventive gout treatments to lower the uric acid levels in your blood with medication of preferably through a gout diet and a change towards a more healthy lifestyle.

Gout relief

Natural treatment for gout to reduce gout swelling :

  • rest the affected gout joint after the initial gout attack for at least 24 hours or until the gout pain subsides
  • a simple yet helpful gout remedy is to elevate painful joints
  • another effective acute gout treatment is to apply ice wrapped in towels to place where the gout attacks occur. Apply for about 25 minutes several times a day. Although the cold can make you feel uncomfortable, your gout symptoms will be way more painful without ice.

Conventional gout remedies :

  • colchicine (a natural yet toxic medication, taken from the corm of the Autumn Crocus or Colchicum) is most effective taken orally within the first 12 hours of the gout attack. You can take colchicine every hour until the gout pain becomes less or the side effects of colchicine like nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps or diarrhea, prevent you from treating gout with more colchicine

Gout arthritis is mostly treated similarly like other forms of arthritis:

  • NSAID’s : non steroidal anti inflammatory drugs taken orally reduce the inflammation caused by deposits of uric acid in the body. Over the counter NSAIDs are aspirin and ibuprofen. Avoid aspirin as it may increase uric acid levels and make your gout symptoms worse. Keep taking aspirin as prescribed by your doctor when you are taking it for prevention or treatment of cardiovascular disease and strokes. As soon as you can get prescribed drugs, ask your doctor for more effective and less evasive NSAIDs used for gout and arthritis like Celebrex. NSAIDs can cause high blood pressure, heart disease, kidney disease, ulcers and heartburn so always ask your doctor what will work best for you
  • injection of Adrenocorticotropic Hormone (ACTH) strongly reduces the inflammation of a gout attack
  • glucocorticosteroids is both an oral as injected gout treatment to reduce inflammation

Gout Prevention

Since there is no real cure for gout, the gout help described below all aim to lower the amount of uric acid in your blood lowering the risk of getting a gout attack. If you reduce the following gout risk factors and keep the cause of gout at bay, you won’t have to suffer another round of gout pain anywhere soon.

Natural gout cures :

  • gout diets are the most effective way of reducing the uric acid level in your blood by eliminating foods that cause gout.
    Do ask your dietician for a gout purine diet.
  • non aggressive weight loss diets are useful for overweight people to lower the risk in developing hyperuricemia – abnormally high levels of uric acid in your blood: above 360 µmol/L (6 mg/dL) for women and above 400 µmol/L (6.8 mg/dL) for men.
  • improving your health, especially when you have a high blood pressure, an under active thyroid gland, Kelly-Seegmiller syndrome, Lesch-Nyhan syndrome (both syndromes where the enzyme that should control the uric acid level in the blood is not or insufficiently present) or any condition that causes a high turnover of death cells producing uric acid in the blood: some cancers, chemotherapy, hemolytic anemia and psoriasis.
  • try to find alternative treatments in order to stay away from medications like:
    • diuretics used to eliminate excess fluid yet decreasing the amount of uric acid that will pass in the urine
    • aspirin as mentioned above or other salicylate containing drugs
    • nicotinic acid vitamine

Conventional gout cures :

  • drug treatments for gout to lower the body’s production of uric acid like allopurinol
  • drug treatments for gout to increase the kidney’s ability to remove uric acid like probenecid.

Do not self medicate these conventional gout treatments as for example it is not recommended to take probenecid when you or your family has a history if kidney stones

Some doctors do prescribe NSAIDs or oral colchicine in small daily doses to prevent future gout attacks. Since every person is different, you do need to keep a gout diary to discover your personal diet for gout and discover which gout treatment works best for you in both acute gout attacks as well as in gout prevention.

Home and herbal remedies for gout

Gout treatments have been written down through the history of men kind, so do incorporate them in your change of gout diet and lifestyle and write them down in your gout diary:

  • some people’s gout cure involve soaking their foot in Epsom Salt when the gout pain is felt in the big toe
  • some old fashion gout sufferers take 2 tablespoons of organic apple cider mixed with 2 tablespoons of organic honey 2 times daily after a gout attack
  • gout diets normally aim to avoid food rich in purines. Food good for gout found through the centuries are: fresh strawberries, cherries and cherry juice, skimmed milk, low fat yogurt, seeds, and grains
  • the more water you drink, the more you can flush way uric acid
  • exercise: exercise is needed to nourish the joint cartilage, to keep in shape and good overall health

The best gout remedy: change your lifestyle

Keep a gout and lifestyle diary in which you keep track of how you are improving your health and which foods could trigger a gout attack:

  • follow a out diet avoiding purine rich food and consuming food that seems to be good for gout
  • maintain a healthy body weight since obese people develop gout 4 times more likely than non obese people
  • exercise at least 30 minutes a day
  • drink as much water or fresh fruit juice as possible
  • gout and alcohol don’t go together well: go easy on alcohol as it dehydrates your body and beer is high in purines
  • find your personal regime of exercise, gout diet and conventional gout treatment

Gout treatment is a lifelong commitment and therefore a change in lifestyle for the better. Always remember that gout is luring under the surface and it’s not because you have it under control, you can forget about it. But when you find your best personal gout treatment, you will be able to enjoy your life without gout attacks!