Information provided by the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Disease
Fortunately, gout can be controlled. People with gout can decrease the severity of attacks and reduce their risk of future attacks by taking their medications as prescribed. Acute gout is best controlled if medications are taken at the first sign of pain or inflammation. Other steps you can take to stay healthy and minimize gout’s effect on your life include the following:
- Tell your doctor about all the medicines and vitamins you take. He or she can tell you if any of them increase your risk of hyperuricemia.
- Plan follow-up visits with your doctor to evaluate your progress.
- Drink plenty of nonalcoholic fluids, especially water. Nonalcoholic fluids help remove uric acid from the body. Alcohol, on the other hand, can raise the levels of uric acid in your blood.
- Exercise regularly and maintain a healthy body weight. Lose weight if you are overweight, but avoid low-carbohydrate diets that are designed for quick weight loss. When carbohydrate intake is insufficient, your body can’t completely burn its own fat. As a consequence, substances called ketones form and are released into the bloodstream, resulting in a condition called ketosis. After a short time, ketosis can increase the level of uric acid in your blood.
- Avoid foods that are high in purines.
High-Purine Foods
Research Highlights
Because uric acid’s role in gout is well understood and medications to ease attacks and reduce the risk or severity of future attacks are widely available, gout is one of the most — if not the most — controllable forms of arthritis. But researchers continue to make advances that help people live with gout. Perhaps someday these advances will prevent this extremely painful disease.
- anchovies
- asparagus
- beef kidneys
- brains
- dried beans and peas
- game meats
- gravy
- herring
- liver
- mackerel
- mushrooms
- sardines
- scallops
- sweetbreads
Some areas of gout research include the following:
- Refining current treatments. Although many medications are available to treat gout, doctors are trying to determine which of the treatments are most effective and at which dosages. Recent studies have compared the effectiveness of different NSAIDs in treating the pain and inflammation of gout and have looked at the optimal dosages of other treatments to control and/or prevent painful attacks.
- Evaluating new therapies. A number of new therapies have shown promise in recent studies including biologic agents that block a chemical called tumor necrosis factor. This chemical is believed to play a role in the inflammation of gout.
- Discovering the role of foods. Gout is the one form of arthritis for which there is proof that specific foods worsen the symptoms. Now, research is suggesting that certain foods may also prevent gout. In one study, scientists found that a high intake of low-fat dairy products reduces the risk of gout in men by half. The reason for this protective effect is not yet known. Another study examining the effects of vitamin C on uric acid suggests that it may be beneficial in the prevention and management of gout and other diseases that are associated with uric acid production.
- Searching for new treatment approaches. Scientists are also studying the contributions of different types of cells that participate in both the acute and chronic joint manifestations of gout. The specific goals of this research are to better understand how urate crystals activate white blood cells called neutrophils, leading to acute gout attacks; how urate crystals affect the immune system, leading to chronic gout; and how urate crystals interact with bone cells in a way that causes debilitating bone lesions among people with chronic gout. The hope is that a better understanding of the various inflammatory reactions that occur in gout will provide innovative clues for treatment.
- Examining how genetics and environmental factors can affect hyperuricemia. Researchers are studying different populations, in which gout is prevalent, to determine how certain genes and environmental factors may affect blood levels of uric acid, which can leak out and crystallize in the joint, leading to gout.
More information on research is available from the following resources:
- ClinicalTrials.gov offers up-to-date information for locating federally and privately supported clinical trials for a wide range of diseases and conditions.
- NIH RePORTER is an electronic tool that allows users to search a repository of both intramural and extramural NIH-funded research projects from the past 25 years and access publications (since 1985) and patents resulting from NIH funding.
- PubMed is a free service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine that lets you search millions of journal citations and abstracts in the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, and preclinical sciences.
This concludes our series on Gout. Do you think you may be suffering from gout? Be sure to see your health care professional and visit www.niams.nih.gov. Be sure to read the February issue on our next series from the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.