Ulcerative Colitis

"In the past, physicians have considered These studies represent an important advance for patients with inflammatory bowel disease and their gastroenterologists searching for safe medications to help with pain relief," said Joshua R.

Korzenik, MD, author of an accompanying editorial from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

"Patients with However, some researchers have argued that these painkillers have negative effects on IBD patients in remission.

According to a study in this month's issue of Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, patients with IBD who use NSAIDs tolerate the drugs well and less than one in three patients experiences a flare-up in symptoms.

Furthermore, the study shows COX-2 inhibitors, previously tho...

The gout study involved about 760 patients and compared febuxostat with allopurinol, both of which remove excess urate from the blood.

Urate deposits crystals in the feet and other joints, causing bouts of painful inflammation.

Over a year, febuxostat was three times more effective at lowering urate to a healthy level.

But the febuxostat patients only had slightly fewer gout attacks by the end.

"You need to be able to follow these patients, I believe, much longer" to see if febuxostat reduces gout attacks better, said lead researcher Dr.

Michael Becker, a rheumatologist and professor at University of Chicago.

Still, he said febuxostat will be helpful to the many patients who cannot take allopurinol or have weak kidneys.

"For them, it's going to be a big advance," said Dr.

Petros Efthimiou, a rheumatologist at University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in Newark.

Gout, a type of arthritis, is so painful patients cannot tolerate bedding touching tender spots.

Yet there have been no new drugs since 1964.

Up to 3 million Americans have gout, the majority of them men, Efthimiou said.

"We're seeing it more and more," Efthimiou said, with the population's increasing obesity and diets rich in purines, found in foods such as asparagus, meat gravies and broth, mushrooms and organ meats.

All eight researchers who wrote the g...