Hey, guywhofishesandhopefullycatchesmorethanme -
fresh off the press. Two well done studies, one in Canada and one down here somewhere studied long term use of Ibuprofen, especially in high doses, and especially for a long period of time.
They showed that Ibuprofen users using it in recommended doses had twice the risk of developing kidney cancer than non users. They studied all other NSAIDs and other OTC meds at the same time.
More worrisome for those with chronic diseases - If the subject took higher doses of Motrin for shorter time periods OR took usual doses for over ten years they had a THREE times increase in kidney cancers!! We know kidney cancer numbers (and many other diseases) have steadily increase relatively recently, and there are undoubtedly multiple causes for this, but Motrin and its lookalikes seem to at the very least involved with this.
Interestingly, with my ongoing back problems over the past 20 years, in order to not prescribe opiods, every doc I’ve been to has urged more and more and higher doses of NSAIDS! Then last fall when my back pains increased a CT showed a tennis ball sized malignant tumor on my right kidney. Cause and effect? I don’t know and couldn’t prove it anyway, as a few hundred thousand people develop it every year.
I studied the original papers looking for some connection with gout and uric acid metabolism, but no increase or flareup s with gout was noticed or at least mentioned, though they were mainly looking at malignancies. You may be a one off reaction to the stuff but I sure wouldn’t take any more if I were you or me!
These new findings do illustrate that you never know what a new drug, or vaccine or whatever will do to humans until you have given millions of doses to millions of people for many many years! Thalidomide, more in my field, is another classics! Antivaxers complain that we are all Guinea pigs, which is true BUT it also true when we take any drug or compound we buy at a pharmacy, grocery store, gas station, dollar store, etc.
I first recall being “detailed” on this fantastic new anti inflammatory drug many years ago ?40-50? And yes it helped many many people with all kinds of aches and pains, menstrual cramps, post surgery pain, but now we find it might have put a few people into a grave, me included, though I’ll tell you in 5-10 years.
But that’s the nature of pharmaceutical research. We have to take the possible bad effects with the good things. It’s never all or one! The risk benefit story over and over.