Jeff Y

Brief Outline: Looking back, Jeff now believes that he was experiencing symptoms of gout for a while before he was diagnosed. He has tophi on his ears and hand. He takes a low dose of allopurinol every day and feels that his gout is under control.

Background: Jeff is married and lives with his wife and two daughters. He is retired, and previously worked in farming and as a Night Guard for a bank. Ethnic background/nationality: White English.

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Looking back, Jeff now believes that he had been experiencing symptoms of gout for a while before he was diagnosed. He had a swollen toe and thought that he had injured it in some way. He had mentioned it in passing when he had visited various GPs for other reasons, but they had not looked at it.
 
Jeff’s toe eventually became very painful. He had recently moved house, so he went to see his new GP to discuss the problem. The GP told Jeff that he had gout. He was prescribed allopurinol tablets. Jeff has not modified his diet in any way because he believes that the causes of gout are genetic.
 
About 10 years later, Jeff saw another new GP about a different health issue, who suggested that he had a blood test to check his uric acid levels while he was there. He remembers being told that his levels were within the normal range.   
 
Jeff has tophi on his ear and his hand. His last attack of gout was three years ago, and he remembers the pain being excruciating. Jeff takes a low dose of allopurinol every day and feels that his gout is under control. 

Jeff Y thought he had knocked his toe. He eventually decided to see a doctor because it became very painful.

I suppose I had had gout a long time before I realised it was gout - and I just thought it was a swollen toe and done nothing about it. It became very painful so I went to the doctor and after a lot of time he said, “Yes, it’s gout.”

So, so when you first had the swollen toe, how long did that go on for before you ended up going to the doctor? 

Oh some time. Weeks if not months, I should think.

And what did you think it was?

Just a swollen toe - damaged it, knocked it, something like that, you know. That’s what basically I thought it was. 

So why did you decide finally to go to the doctor's then?

Because it became so painful [Laughter].

Okay. And you said when you went to the doctor's - after some time. 

Yes

It was diagnosed as gout. Can you tell me what happened?

Well I went, went to the - well we moved house a lot, and we came up to [where we are living now] and went to a new doctor, naturally, and as I say - yes, just said, “Well I think you’ve got gout.” 

Jeff says be persistent and tell your doctor what you want to know about treatments.

Go to the doctor and, and don’t take no for an answer. Say that you want to, you want to find out what dose is required, and what drug is required. In retrospect I should have done that, but I was younger and, and it’s the least of your worries really.

Jeff thinks it is important for health professionals to be clear that gout is a lifelong condition that can be managed effectively.

Oh my advice would be, to be absolutely straightforward about it. No - no sort of might be or - or around the edges if you know what I mean. “Look you’ve got it, you’ve got it for life, we’ll manage it, all we can do, we can’t cure it, we can manage it and it’s down to you to manage it, you know, we’ll try this, we’ll try that and when we’ve got something then it’s down to you to manage it.”