How Can You Cope With Attacks?


What Should My Treatment Plan Include?

This is a more complicated question than you might think! There are many factors to consider, including the number and severity of attacks, what happens between attacks, and the potential long-term health issues associated with gout. When you think about your treatment plan for gout, it may help to divide it into these three parts:

  1. Relieving the pain of an attack when it comes
  2. Reducing the chances of having future attacks
  3. Considering gout’s impact on your long-term health

Handling the Pain

You may be tempted to concentrate only on relieving the pain of an attack. When an attack comes, you can’t think about anything except your gout. So when the attack is over, you may not want to think about it at all. But if you’re just treating the pain, are you doing everything you can?

Treatment for the pain of a gout flare works to reduce the inflammation that causes the attack or lessen the pain you feel during an attack. But medications used to treat the gout attack, such as anti-inflammatories and analgesics, do not address the primary risk factor for gout—hyperuricemia.

Reducing Your Chances of Future Attacks

Some medications may be given during or immediately after an attack—such treatment is given specifically to relieve the pain and inflammation. (Your healthcare provider may also continue to use these medications to help reduce your chances of having another attack.) Other medications work to address hyperuricemia—the primary risk factor for gout—over time, reducing the likelihood of future attacks. Continuous treatment that lowers uric acid levels can also improve the signs and symptoms of gout over time. Whether you are having an attack or not, take the medicines your healthcare provider has prescribed. Carefully follow instructions about how much medicine to take and when to take it.

Dietary and lifestyle changes may also help:

  • Maintain a healthy body weight and a well-balanced diet.
  • Avoid alcohol, especially beer.
  • Exercise regularly.

Considering Potential Long-Term Health Problems Associated With Gout

Hyperuricemia—high uric acid levels in the blood—is the underlying cause of gout. Lowering your uric acid levels may not only help control your gout—reducing the number of painful attacks you have—but may also improve the signs and symptoms of other gout-related problems over time. Uncontrolled gout has many potential long-term problems, many of which can continue to worsen even when you’re not having an attack. These long-term problems may include:

  • Worsening joint damage—which can continue between attacks
  • Growth of kidney stones
  • Problems with kidney function
  • Development of tophi—large deposits of uric acid crystals—that can cause:

With proper treatment, most people with gout are able to control their symptoms and the progression of the disease. But a long-term gout treatment plan needs to address hyperuricemia from the start.

Talk to your healthcare provider about a long-term treatment plan. Make sure you have a plan you understand and can commit to. You may want to use the diary provided on this site as a starting point for discussions with your healthcare provider.

Some points to consider:

  • Changing your diet may help, but it is often not enough by itself to control hyperuricemia.
  • Some medications may help control hyperuricemia, as long as they are taken consistently and as directed. By not following your healthcare provider’s instructions, you not only lose any protection the medication may have provided, but inconsistent use of such medication can actually cause attacks.
  • Once you have a plan—diet, medication, or both—you need to talk to your doctor about how it is working for you. Are you able to stick to the plan? (Be honest!) Are your gout attacks less frequent? Less painful?
  • From time to time, your doctor may want to test your uric acid level with a simple blood test. That can tell you and your healthcare provider whether your hyperuricemia is under control. Remember, you’re not just looking to reduce the risk of future gout attacks but also to head off potential long-term complications.

So ask your doctor about your gout treatment plan. Does it allow you to handle the pain of attacks? Reduce the chances of future attacks? Address the potential for long-term health problems?