Featuring Dr. John Wade, MD, FRCPC, Rheumatologist

Duration: 3 minutes, 50 seconds

The treatment of pseudogout is fairly straightforward. If one has pain and swelling in a single joint, then often, the most effective way of dealing with it is to put a cortisone injection into that joint. Sometimes if it’s in a joint that it’s hard to do, that’s not always feasible. But if you are able to inject the joint, that’s what your specialist will probably do.

If it’s a number of joints, or it’s difficult to inject the joint, then your doctor will look at other medications to treat the acute inflammation. As with other types of arthritis, non-steroidal anti-inflammatories, some medications like ibuprofen and naproxen are very effective in treating the symptoms of acute pain and swelling of pseudogout. And if there are no contraindications to anti-inflammatories, then this may be a very effective treatment to treat your symptoms of pseudogout.

If you’re not able to use anti-inflammatories because you have problems such as an ulcer, or you have kidney problems, or you have high blood pressure problems, there is a medication called colchicine, which can be very effective to treat pseudogout. This medication is also used to treat gout. Colchicine is a pill, and you can give the pill once a day or two or three tablets a day to reduce the symptoms of the pain and swelling in the joint, and also to keep the symptoms away.

Presenter: Dr. John Wade, Rheumatologist, Vancouver, BC

Local Practitioners: Rheumatologist