Many years ago, while on vacation at home, I received a call from a patient. The man sounded completely distraught when he reported: He was suffering from severe stomach pains and had just vomited dark blood. I had known the patient and his medical history for a long time and very well. In his mid-fifties, he frequently took diclofenac for his gout attacks.

Gout is a metabolic disease in which the joints become inflamed. If a gout attack occurs, in which the joints become very painfully swollen within a very short time, so-called non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as diclofenac are suitable for combating the acute joint inflammation.

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