Indomethacin and Gout Pain Relief

Indomethacin (often sold under the Indocin brand name) is the most commonly prescribed anti-inflammatory drug for reducing painful gout swelling. It acts upon the hormones that cause swelling and pain.

It is available as regular capsules, sustained release capsules, liquid and suppositories. Recently, it has become available as indomethacin ointment.

You may need to take capsules or liquid with milk or food to reduce the chance of stomach upset.

Do not open sustained release (SR) capsules – they must be taken whole.

Over-the-counter medicines can contain similar anti-inflammatory drugs, e.g. Ibuprofen, aspirin.
Do not take any other medication alongside indomethacin without consulting your doctor.

Why Take Indomethacin For Gout?

Please see the Indomethacin Guidelines for full information about why indomethacin helps relieve gout pain.

Indomethacin Dosage For Gout

Here are some general notes. Please see the Indomethacin Guidelines for specific gout dosage information.

Never exceed the prescribed dosage.
Always wait the prescribed time before taking your next dose.
If you think you have overdosed, seek emergency medical treatment immediately.
Symptoms of overdose include any of the following:

Blurred vision
Breathing
Dizziness
Drowsiness
Headache
Nausea
Ringing in the ears
Seizures
Stomach pain
Sweating
Tingling or numbness
Urine much reduced or stopped
Vomiting

Indomethacin Side Effects

Please see the Indomethacin Side Effects page. For gout treatment without side effects, see Gout Pain Relief. Also, you should be aware of general gout medication side effects.

Indomethacin Health Warnings

Indomethacin is a member of the NSAIDs (Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs) group of drugs. All these drugs can have severe, even fatal, effects on the stomach. It is appropriate for short term use, at the lowest dose possible, to treat pain from gout flares, but never for more than a few days.

Vision problems are associated with this drug.

Alternative Spellings

Like many medicines, indomethacin is often misspelled. Though spelling is often overrated, it pays to take extra care with medicines, as a misunderstanding might cause treatment problems in the unlikely event of a similar sounding drug being taken mistakenly.

In the list below, I have included brand names, where the active ingredient is indomethacin alone. When buying medicine, it is usually best to use the generic name rather than a brand name, unless additional active ingredients make the gout medicine more useful to you.

Endomethacin: Indo replaced by Endo.
Idomethacin: Indo replaced by Ido – missing n.
Indo: A common abbreviation, but not recommended, as abbreviations can often cause confusion.
Indomecine: thacin replaced by cine. This appears most frequently in Chinese articles.
Indomenthacin: meth replaced by menth.
Indometacin: A very common alternative (dropping the h), which is the main spelling in some countries. See the indometacin page for more details.
Indomethacin: This is the correct spelling of the NSAID that is used to
relieve gout pain by reducing inflammation. Full details can be found in
the indomethacin pages in the Anti-Inflammatory Gout Cure part of the Gout Treatment Section.
Indomethacin Brands: Common brand names include: Arthrexin, Indocin; Indocid; Indomethacinum; Indomethazine; Imbrilon; Metindol; Tannex; and Novo-Methacin.
Indomethacine: e added at end – French spelling. Also occurs as indometacine.
Indomethacyn: cin replaced by cyn – possibly Indonesian or other language.
indomethasin: thacin replaced by thasin – s instead of c.
Indomethcin: missing a near end.
Indomethecin: a replaced by e.
Indomethicin: a replaced by i. Also gets written as endomethicin.
Indomethocin: a replaced by o.

If you are aware of other alternative spellings or common brand names, please share them on the gout forum.

Indomethacin and Gout Pain

Indometacin works by controlling the body’s reaction to uric acid deposits in the joints. It reduces pain, but does nothing to help reduce those deposits. See the Reaction part of U-D-R-P for more information.