Background Colchicine can reduce the risk of recurrent attacks and it is an appropriate first-line gout attack prophylaxis therapy. There is limited data in the literature about duration of colchicine treatment in patients with gout disease.

Objectives In this study, we aimed to investigate the frequency of gout attacks between patients with colchicine treatment and patients who are colchicine terminated.

Methods 54 gout patients under colchicine treatment were enrolled to the study. The subjects were divided into 2 groups. Group 1 (n=19) was consisted of patients whom colchicine therapy was terminated because of remission for three months; group 2 (n=35) was consisted of patients on colchicine treatment. Groups were compared according to the existing of newly gout attacks after the 3rd month. Baseline and the third months of the uric acid levels were also analyzed in each group.

Results The body mass indexes, the disease intervals, the number of the attacks, and the duration of the attacks were not significantly different (p>0.05 for all) (Table 1). Compared to the group 2, the newly gout attacks were not found to be different in group 1 for 3 months (p>0.05) (Table 1). The uric acid levels were significantly decreased both in two groups (both p<0.05) (Table 2).

Conclusions The colchicine is the mainstay treatment for gout disease. It not only prevents the attacks of the gouts also prevents the development of uric acid nephropathy that exaggerates the kidney disease in gout patients. This study showed that, in gout patients in remission, termination of the colchicine treatment does not affect the development of the new attacks as shown similar attacks were also observed in non-terminated patients.

Disclosure of Interest None declared