Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Is Gout Really Just Arthritis?

By Paul Mahon

Gout is caused by the buildup of too much uric acid in the body. Uric acid comes from the breakdown of substances called purines. Purines are found in all of your body's tissues. They are also in many foods, such as liver, dried beans and peas, and anchovies.

In the normal flow of life your body dissolves the uric acid that you intake via food and drink, your kidneys work to filter uric acids out of your body. Now if you have a kidney disease, have had one removed or maybe have had a kidney transplanted then you may well be suffering with gout as a side effect.

Abnormally high levels of uric acid will result in your body becoming unable to process it and that leads to Gout.The kidneys too can be overwhelmed by the amount of uric acid and they will then fail to cleanse the body adequately.

Hyperuricemia is the word that you need to listen for, if your Dr mentions that then you know you have elevated levels of uric acid in your body and are at an increased risk of gout. No need to panic instantly though as you are not certain to develop gout, you can change your diet and alcohol intake and get the levels of uric acid in your blood back down to safe levels.

If you are reading this and you are a man then there is a good chance that you have or will develop gout, the risk of women developing gout is much lower than men. This may be due to the differences in diet or alcohol intake. Men tend to eat more red meat than women and that is a contributing factor for gout.

You may notice that your big toe feels really hot at first and then the toe may look swollen and red. Then when you are in bed that night you will be woken up with an excrutiating pain in your big toe, it will usually hurt just to have the bed sheet touching your toe. Gout attacks are painful and yet it is all caused by tiny uric acid crystals.

The only good thing about gout is that you can control it relatively easily, you are in charge of what you eat and drink so you can control how much puric acid enters your body. The less purine rich food and drink you take in the less there is for your kidneys to deal with and that means they will be less likely to leave enough in your body to create uric acid crystals and give you an attack of gout.

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