Colchicine and Clarithromycin Interaction

Understanding the Colchicine and Clarithromycin Interaction

FDA-approved prescribing information for these two drugs flags their combination as a major-severity interaction. Colchicine belongs to the Anti-Gout Agent class and Clarithromycin belongs to the Macrolide Antibiotic class - two categories that can collide when co-prescribed. The mechanism described in FDA labeling is: Clarithromycin blocks the enzymes and transporters that remove colchicine from your body, which can lead to toxic levels of the drug. Severity tiers matter: major flags generally advise avoidance, moderate flags often require monitoring or dose adjustment, and minor flags may only call for awareness.

Context around a specific patient determines real-world impact. Colchicine has 28 total documented interactions on file in this dataset, and Clarithromycin has 81. Each additional medication compounds the interaction surface, which is why pharmacists run full-profile checks rather than evaluating one pair at a time. FDA-derived guidance for this pair is: Avoid this combination if you have kidney or liver issues, and ensure your doctor reduces your colchicine dose if your organs are healthy. Timing of doses, renal and hepatic function, age, and other concurrent prescriptions all shape whether a labeled interaction matters clinically.

An interaction flag is not a verdict. A large share of labeled interactions are managed routinely in clinical practice, the fix may be as simple as spacing doses or adding a monitoring test. Others require the prescriber to choose a different medication entirely. This page surfaces FDA-sourced labeling and openFDA data for educational purposes only; it is not medical advice and cannot account for your full clinical picture. Never start, stop, or adjust either Colchicine or Clarithromycin based on a web page, speak with your prescriber or pharmacist before making any change.