Double blind controlled comparison of aspirin, allopurinol and placebo in the management of arthralgia during pyrazinamide administration.

Chinese patients with arthralgia during treatment with an antituberculosis regimen containing pyrazinamide were allocated at random to 3 anti-arthralgia treatment series in a controlled double-blind study. One series (18 patients) received soluble aspirin 2.4 g daily, the second (23 patients) allopurinol 200 mg daily, and the third (19 patients) placebo only, for 8 weeks. The response was assessed both by independent assessors and by the patients themselves using a diary card. The serum uric acid concentration was measured before and during anti-arthralgia treatment. The joints most commonly affected were the shoulders, the knees and the fingers, and symptoms and signs were in general neither severe nor protracted. For most of the patients in all 3 series the joint symptoms and signs improved during the 8 weeks, but a higher proportion of patients in the aspirin and placebo series than in the allopurinol series experienced improvement, this being most rapid in the aspirin series. Only in the aspirin series was the mean serum uric acid concentration lower during treatment than before it, and this effect was related to the dose in mg per kg. It is concluded that the arthralgia was often self-limiting, that aspirin had a small beneficial effect, that allopurinol, in the dosage studied, may have had a slightly deleterious effect, but that it would be worth studying larger dosages of allopurinol because the dosage studied did not affect the serum uric acid concentration.