I was rudely snatched out of my peaceful sleep in the middle of the night last night by an excruciating pain in the big toe of my right foot. TFW?! Seems that a uric acid crystal has decided to take up residence in the joint at the base of my big toe.
I knew some serious pain when my appendix ruptured a few years back. This comes close to that! Gout sucks!! Pray that you never get it. i can’t walk. I can’t sleep. I can hardly concentrate on the book i’m trying to read. The worst part is no beer till it’s gone. I’m OK with that if it will make my toe stop hurting.
Both beer and red meat can contribute to attacks. Go to the doctor. There’s something they can prescribe that really helps, and quickly too. I can’t remember the name of it at the moment but it’s basically a standard painkiller along with a very strong anti-inflammatory drug.
Cherry juice and fruit…consume them in the interum until you get RX from your Dr.
Edit: My aching foot is the heel. Plantar Fasciitis it seems 24 years of pounding the concrete
is taking it’s toll. I have been getting some Physical Therapy to some small relief…dry needling sux.
My father suffered from it, but he was in his 70’s.
Alcohol is one of the culprits. When I went on my Martini “investigations” by drinking 5 a night and eating lots of cheese and cured meats, a flare-up in the medial dorsal aspect of my left foot halted things quickly. I self-diagnosed myself and took an extended break from the hard stuff. That and drinking plenty of water reversed my incipient gout in just over a week. That sh!t is painful- especially if one is on their feet all day long. Thinking about it, I haven’t had a martini since…
Some of my colleagues have it, and they help combat the symptoms by wearing Crocs.
My brother calls this “drunk toe”. He calls me every now and then for a prescription. For rare cases i usually will prescribe indomethacin 50mg three times a day or colchicine 0.6mg every 6 hours for a few days. if you get it often (read poor bastard) i use allopurinol 300mg daily. there is also a new med out (gets advertised a lot) called uloric. fortunately my brother was able to alter his diet and stop the attacks without stopping beer. ;D
i can tell you that risk factors are risk factors but genetics plays some role. even more than what people eat it is how much. same with sugar, cholesterol, blood pressure issues. 80-90 percent of my patients would be off meds (and i would be even more broke) if their weight was appropriate
I get attacks about once or twice a year. It really does suck, especially when your usually pretty active. When you can’t walk or run, life gets miserable fast.
I’ve been reading up on gout. Seems that diet is not the cause of gout, but if you have gout, food and drink can trigger a flare-up. It’s a chronic disease that can be controlled to varying degrees, depending on the person, but there is no cure at the present time. Diet and lifestyle can reduce the reccurence of the painful flare-ups. If left untreated it can be disfiguring.
All well and good… I just wish my F-ing toe would stop hurting so bad. I am taking a NSAID (ibuprophin) for the pain and inflamation. It seems to help quite a bit. But, I’m a bike rider and a hiker. Right now I can’t even put a sock on my foot. I need to ride and hike!
Fortunately Pele is taking a break right now, so I’m not missing any photo ops out in the lava fields.
I had an attack about a year and a half ago. I just waited it out and it went away on it’s own. In January, after enjoying a bit of bourbon a few too many nights in a row, it came back. Same story, it went away in about 5-7 days and i thought nothing of it. Except this time, it came back within the next week. I was talking to my dad about it and he said he has been on medication for his since he was about my age. Went to see a doc about it and am waiting on the blood work to come back, but I’m sure that’s what it is. I’ve definitely changed my diet and have severely cut back on alcohol. I’ve implemented a vegetarian night and a seafood night to my weekly meals to try and cut back on red meat.
As someone who works in an orthopedic office here is my recommendation/cyber medicine:
Ibuprofen likely will not be a strong enough anti-inflammatory. Indocin or Indomethicin is first line in treatment of gout flares.
See your family doc or an orthopedist. You will need a perscription for the indocin. There are other medications that they can also use to treat your current symptoms and prevent recurrence of gout flares as weithman5 stated above.
An orthopedist can give you a steroid injection into your joint to give you very quick relief. Sometimes they will aspirate some fluid and send it to the lab to confirm you truly have gout in your big toe. FYI the shot hurts like hell.
Sometimes there is a stiff soled sandal or post op shoe you can wear to unload the foot when walking until your symptoms subside.
Yes, diet restrictions will help minimize but not prevent future gout flare ups.
Good luck! Too bad you are in Hawaii and not Omaha. I could get you the hook up today
Thanks guys! My doctor agrees. I have a prescription for indomethacin now. The ibuprophin was an in-my-house-already stop-gap until I could get the prescription filled.
I also have a very cool antique walking cane my wife bought for me in the French Quarter back when we first met. I may be limping, but I’m looking dapper as I do.
Man, good luck getting this under control. I thought I was starting down this road(thoght I had a flareup) and got my uric acid level tested. Tested within normal but still freaked me out. Got my fingers crossed for me and you…
It is not uncommon to have a gout flare up with a normal uric acid level. I see it quite often, actually. The best way to determine if you truly have a gout flare up is to send fluid from the affected joint to the lab to evaluate for crystals under the microscope.
Wow. That’s good to know(I guess!). My doc didn’t tell me that. Wait, would that mean a needle in my big toe joint?
Thanks for the info, I’ve got an appt. next month and will be asking questions…
My labs just came back. Gout it is…lucky me. Good news is both cholesterol levels came back in the excellent range and my BP was the lowest I’ve ever seen it. Like my wife said, gout we can deal with a lot easier than all that other stuff.
