I was told in 1982 in Berlin Germany to use Colchicine as first line therapy for acute pericarditis.  I had about 5 cases in a single month after Smallpox Vaccination in 2004 in preparation for deployment.  All did very well on just Colchicine.

 

Actually the EKG often normalizes in a single day.

Thanks! The material is really great!

Colchicine is quite effective in my experience, but in elderly pateints, the side effects are sometimes quite serious. One of my patints developed a severe myopathy with high CPKs, muscle weakness, reversed slowly with stopping the colchicine. Also, hepatic enzymes were elevated for weeks. Colchicine dose was 0.6 mg daily. Dr Spodick of Boston first suggested this therapy at a Rancho Sante Fe meeting in 1972.

George Lowe MD Austin Texas

My experience went like this, was on a mini vacation from my night job as a RN of 16 years, I was happy to be off from work and away for at least two days.
The first night I got ready for bed. As I laid down,  starting to fall asleep, all of a sudden out of nowhere like nothing ever before a feeling of sand paper friction in my chest started.
The only real way of describing the discomfort was if a large piece of food got stuck in your esophagus in and around the left chest area. That feeling of pressure in a specific area the left chest.
I thought at first indigestion, so i popped a Prevacid and tried waiting it out, even though i really didn't eat anything except a breakfast 12 hours ago.
As i lay in bed hoping the Prevacid would kick in I then felt a growing discomfort in my left armpit. This discomfort then went down my entire left arm. Not pain but a feeling of chill and dull ache.
Because of my medical training I'm thinking the worst, the dreaded heart attack or angina. So of course i felt an anxiety attack. The laying down made the pain worse. I thought i would take a hot shower to open the blood vessels, since i had no access to nitrosublingal.
I sat in the shower for a full 30 minutes, felt 100% better.
Of course i did not want to alarm my wife so i kept it to myself and went back to bed.
As i laid in bed anxiously hoping all is well, the pain in my left chest came back and then my left arm. This time the pain was stronger.
I jumped up and woke up my wife and asked her for her codeine #3, still distressed with anxiety i took my clonazepam that i use sparingly for sleep. I was able to get some that night and woke up feeling like this bad experience has passed.
The next day I was fine did a lot of sight seeing with no reminders of the previous night.
That night I laid down again not even thinking about the incident the night before.
As i started to fall a sleep the pain came back in my chest and left arm this time exactly as the night before.
I was really scared i was going to end up in a emergency room.
I panicked again and went into the hot shower and sat there for 30 minutes trying to decide what the best course of action would be. The pain was relieved by sitting and standing and the anxiety also relieved. I was still concerned it would return when i laid back down.
Sure enough as I laid down back in bed the pain came back exactly the same, the chest, the left arm and now i couldn't take it anymore. I woke the wife up and said there is something wrong with this hotel room that doesn't feel right. Maybe I thought the air conditioning unit was too strong or blowing on me, but adjusting it didn't help so we decided it was best to leave.
Still upset and unnerved we got into the car where the sitting position relieved the pain after 15 minutes of driving. By this time i made the connection of the pain and relief with the  position changes. The two hour drive gave me a lot time to think about it. If it was angina related then I needed to face the truth and go to emergency room.  The position changes from lying down causing the pain to standing or sitting that gave me relief from the pain kept me puzzled during the drive home.
So when we got home of course i was curious as hell.
So i logged on the internet and searched the symptoms and came across pericarditis.
Now at home the pain returned exactly the same as I laid down to sleep. Now i panicked again and thought OK ill take a 600 Motrin (and aspirin just to be safe) as the internet treatment of choice.
The pain had left as i sat at the computer and read the internet for more info about pericarditis.
Yes i did diagnose the problem myself. No i am not an expert. I read that i take three 600 mg Motrin a day, that the condition might be viral, I have no fever, and my condition was acute and that would take 1 to 3 weeks to reslove and that a recurrence would be most likely in the future.
I normally never play doctor as an RN, but working in the medical field i have seen many patients treated well and others misdiagnosed and wrongly treated by many experts. I would never play around with anything cardiac for sure. But since all my symptoms are classic with pericarditis i felt i have called this one for sure.
Hoping the Motrin and Aspirin help.
So far so good.
Thanks all for sharing.