The Best Diet For Gout
Gout, which is a form of arthritis that occurs when uric acid builds up in blood and causes inflammation, affects more than 8.3 million people in the United States.
Whats the reason? People are getting bigger and theyre eating too much of the wrong thing, says Robert Hiltz MD, a rheumatologist at Group Health.
If youre prone to gout attacks, Dr. Hiltz says eating the right foods can stave off attacks or, at the very least, help manage flare-ups.
- Related post: Why Do I Have Gout?
Alcohol Is The Biggest Risk Factor For Gout
It is well-established that frequent alcohol intake dramatically increases risk of gout .
The Framingham Heart Study of over 4,500 participants provides some perspective.
Researchers found that regular alcohol use was associated with three times greater risk of gout in women compared to those who have less than 2 standard drinks per week. For men, regular drinkers had double the risk of non-drinkers .
Beer seems to be the worst, followed by hard liquors such as spirits. Interestingly, moderate wine consumption is not linked with any risk .
The reason why alcohol increases uric acid levels is still not well-understood. Some forms, particularly beer, can be high in purines but they are certainly not the richest source of purines in our diet.
Additional theories propose that excessive alcohol may also reduce the bodys ability to excrete uric acid. Others state that alcohol especially beer increases the chemical breakdown of purine-containing ATP nucleotides, which is a precursor of uric acid production .
Summary: Regular alcohol intake severely raises uric acid levels in the blood. It doubles, if not triples your risk of gout.
What Increases Your Chances For Gout
The following make it more likely that you will develop hyperuricemia, which causes gout:
- Being male
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Why Uric Acid Levels Rise
Uric acid is a waste product. You end up with high uric acid levels for two reasons: your body produces too much, or your kidneys remove too little. Several factors increase your chances of having high levels of uric acid, such as:
- Being overweight or obese
- Being male, especially between 30-50 years of age
- Having a family history of gout
- Undergoing a trauma or surgery
Because uric acid is a byproduct of purine, your diet also plays a significant role in your chances of having gout.
High Purine Vegetables Are Ok
Some vegetables and plant foods, such as peas, beans, lentils, spinach, mushrooms, oats, and cauliflower, are high in purines. However, several studies have shown that they do not increase the risk of gout.
In fact, the opposite seems to be true, with a vegetable-rich diet being associated with a lower risk of gout compared with the lower consumption of vegetables. Therefore, you do not need to limit or avoid any vegetables on a gout-friendly diet.
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Green Vegetables And Tubers Contain Less Purines
Nutritionists say that the best food for Gout sufferers is fiber. Fiber has the ability to slow down the absorption of protein, and at the same time reduce protein degradation for energy, so it reduces the formation of uric acid . Thereby supporting the treatment of Gout, minimizing the symptoms of arthritis pain after each meal.
Cabbage, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Cucumber, Celery, Eggplant, White Radish, Pumpkin are cool vegetables, low in purines, rich in vitamins and minerals. This is an ideal food for people with Gout, helping cool the body temperature. They have the ability to limit the deposition of urate crystals in bones and joints, promote uric acid excretion through the urinary tract, and effectively support the treatment of Gout.
Besides, people with Gout should avoid vegetables such as Mint, Bean Sprouts, Asparagus, Peas and Mushrooms, because of their high nutrient content, high in purines, which will cause severe joint pain, intense, making the symptoms of Gout worse.
Sugary Foods And Beverages
High blood sugar levels can increase the risk of a gout attack. When the body breaks down your sugar consumption, it releases purines into your bloodstream.You should limit your intake of sweet fruit juices and eliminate high-fructose corn syrup from your diet. Avoid eating candies, baked goods, and sweetened cereal.
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How Are You Diagnosed With Gout
There are several ways to help your doctor determine the condition:
- Dual-energy computerized tomography scan Its an imaging machine that can spot urate crystals in a joint even if not swollen. Doctors dont commonly use this test because its not widely available and a little costly.
- Ultrasound Using a musculoskeletal ultrasound can help determine urate crystals in a joint and is more common than the previous test.
- X-ray Using x-rays can aid your doctor in identifying other causes of joint swelling.
- Blood test A blood test can measure creatinine and uric acid levels in the blood. Some patients may have high levels of uric acid with no symptoms, while others experience symptoms but dont have a high uric acid level.
- Joint fluid test Your doctor can also extract fluid from the affected joint using this test. With the use of a microscope, the extracted fluid may help them check urate crystals.
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What’s The Best Thing To Do If You Find Mold On A Slice Of Bread
Do you see green or black fuzzy spots on the piece of bread you’re about to throw into the toaster? Toss out the whole loaf! Don’t just throw away the pieces with the mold. That’s because the mold may have spread to other parts of the loaf.
There are a few different kinds of mold that pop up on bread. The blue-gray-green fuzzy mold is the same fungus that can produce penicillin.
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Plenty Of Fruit And Vegetables
The recommendation is five portions per day, but try to include as many as possible. Bulking out meals, such as Bolognese, casseroles and stews with vegetables can help to reduce the meat content. Fruit and vegetables contain vitamin C. Although evidence is unclear, high intakes of vitamin C may help to reduce uric acid levels in the blood. Cherries may be particularly useful to include in the diet, as they have also been found to reduce levels of uric acid in the blood.
What Effect Do Your Weight And Diet Have
Some studies suggest that certain foods are linked to gout attacks. Gout attacks are apparently more common in people who have eaten a lot of meat, fish or seafood a few days before. That matches many people’s experiences. On the other hand, purine-rich plant-based foods such as peas, beans, lentils, spinach, mushrooms, oats, cauliflower and broccoli were found to have little to no effect on the risk of a gout attack. Overall, there hasnt been much good quality research into the link between certain foods and gout attacks.
Eating cherries is sometimes recommended to prevent gout attacks, but theres no scientific proof that it can help prevent gout.
Because not everybody has the same metabolism, its a good idea to try out for yourself what helps you and what doesnt and how much of different foods your body tolerates. Some people feel better after changing their diet, while others successfully lower their uric acid levels with medication and cope just fine without any changes to their diet.
Individual studies also suggest that losing weight can help if you’re very overweight. People with gout should be careful not to go without any food, though fasting can itself trigger a gout attack.
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Can You Get Rid Of Gout
It ought to be fairly clear why youd need to get gone gout, but is it essentially feasible?
Sure is definitely, but theres not a one-size meets all solution.
In the next section, well turn out to be going over whats worked ideal for us!
You wont want to miss out on this free training video.
NOTICE: Id highly recommend going to your doctor or seeing a specialist about this situation, since we arent experts. See our medical disclaimer for more details.
We dont know what will work for you, but we know whats worked for us and others
What Are The Symptoms Of Gout
Gout is a very painful condition and a typical gout attack usually develops over a two to three hour period and often resolves within two weeks. The NHS advises that you always see a doctor if you experience the symptoms of gout, which include sudden, severe pain in any joint or red, hot, swollen skin over any joint.
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Why Do People Get Gout
Gout is a type of arthritis causing pain and swelling in the joints. The symptoms usually occur as flares lasting for a week or two and then go away. Gout flares usually start in the big toe or a lower limb.
The disease happens when the body has high levels of a substance called uric acid or urate. When high levels of uric acid build up, the needle-shaped urate crystals form in and around the joints. This causes inflammation and arthritis of the affected joint. Many people with high serum uric acid, however, may not develop gout.
Some factors may increase a persons risk for gout, including
- Male gender
Gout is a lifelong disease and cannot be cured. The disease, however, is one of the most controllable forms of arthritis. It can be effectively managed with early diagnosis, medications and lifestyle changes.
What Are The Signs And Symptoms Of Gout
Gout flares start suddenly and can last days or weeks. These flares are followed by long periods of remissionweeks, months, or yearswithout symptoms before another flare begins. Gout usually occurs in only one joint at a time. It is often found in the big toe. Along with the big toe, joints that are commonly affected are the lesser toe joints, the ankle, and the knee.
Symptoms in the affected joint may include:
- Pain, usually intense
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The Primary Uric Acid Culprits
Uric acid is one of those things that you might not give a second thought to unless youve experienced gout. Uric acid is a waste product that your body produces when it digests certain foods, especially those high in purines, including:
- Red meat especially game meat like venison
- Organ meat
- Seafood, such as crab or shrimp
- Fish, such as mackerel and tuna
- Alcohol, including beer
While foods high in glucose arent high in purines, a high-fructose diet may make you more vulnerable to a gout attack, so you should avoid sweetened foods and beverages, like sodas.
Which Other Lifestyle Factors Can Affect Gout
While there are no controlled studies or evidence on the effect of lifestyle changes on the incidence of gout, expert opinion is that positive changes in lifestyle can be beneficial to the management of gout. Being overweight is not recommended for gout suffers and the available evidence indicates that losing weight may helpful. Dietary modifications to achieve a healthy body weight are recommended, however the use of crash, high-protein and low-carbohydrate diets should be avoided. Slow and steady weight loss is ideal and support from a dietitian should be sought to help develop a sustainable and balanced weight loss plan. Rapid weight loss is not recommended as it can increase the amount of uric acid in the body leading to an increased chance of a gout attack.
Regular exercise such as swimming or walking is also recommended as it may help reduce the frequency of gout attacks. In addition, it may have a beneficial effect on associated co-morbidities such as type 2 diabetes, hypertension and insulin resistance.
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Health Conditions And Treatments
Certain drugs, health problems, and lifestyle choices can trigger gout, too.
Medications. Aspirin, certain diuretics for high blood pressure , and drugs for people who had organ transplants can trigger gout. After a flare, go over all the medicines you take with your doctor. If needed, they should be able to find another option.
Being overweight. When you slim down, you can protect yourself from another flare.
Fasting or crash diets. If you lose weight too quickly or fast, you could raise your chances of an attack.
High blood pressure, kidney disease, diabetes, and heart disease. These health conditions make you more likely to have gout, especially if you donât get treatment. Work with your doctor to keep them under control.
Injuries or surgery. When your body is stressed or sick, youâre more likely to have a flare. Of course, you canât always avoid this trigger. But if you need to have an operation, make sure your doctor knows youâve had gout in the past.
How Does A Doctor Diagnose Gout
If you have sudden or severe pain in a joint, you should talk to your primary care provider . Your PCP may send you to a rheumatologist, a doctor who specializes in gout and other kinds of arthritis.
Healthcare providers consider several things when confirming gout:
- Symptoms: The provider will ask you to describe your symptoms, how often they happen and how long they last.
- Physical examination: Your provider will examine the affected joint to look for swelling, redness and warmth.
- Blood work: A test can measure the amount of uric acid in your blood.
- Imaging tests: You may have pictures taken of the affected joint with X-rays, an ultrasound or MRI.
- Aspiration: The provider may use a needle to pull fluid from the joint. Using a microscope, a team member can look for uric acid crystals or a different problem .
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The End Of Gout Your Ultimate Beginners Approach
Shelly Mannings The End of Gout is not only a fascinating read its also refreshingly practical.
Shelly gives you two simple quick-starts:
Eat more of these
Eat fewer of these
This simple modification can correct many years of gout-causing errors within your eating. And you can start this immediately within minutes of receiving the program.That really helped my problem of What Should You Eat During A Gout Attack.
The next step is to follow Shellys 7-day plan.
It tightens up the quick start advice and turns it into a solid, follow-along program.
The 7-day plan was the real clincher for me.
I am a pretty average cook Im competent but not at all skilled or adventurous. Turns out I didnt need to be.
The plan takes away all the thinking and gives me, for the first week, something I can simply copy.
After the first 7 days I used Shellys advice to adapt the plan according to my own tastes.
Which was pretty easy the plan is full of options so you can try different foods and see what you like best.
Its all food you can buy in your supermarket. And it includes lots of nice stuff the chocolate and strawberries desserts were real winners in my house!
How Does Food Affect Gout
If you have gout, certain foods may trigger an attack by raising your uric acid levels.
Trigger foods are commonly high in purines, a substance found naturally in foods. When you digest purines, your body makes uric acid as a waste product .
This is not a concern for healthy people, as they efficiently remove excess uric acid from the body.
However, people with gout cant efficiently remove excess uric acid. Thus, a high-purine diet may let uric acid accumulate and cause a gout attack (
10 ).
Foods that commonly trigger gout attacks include organ meats, red meats, seafood, alcohol and beer. They contain a moderate-to-high amount of purines .
However, there is one exception to this rule. Research shows that high-purine vegetables do not trigger gout attacks .
And interestingly, fructose and sugar-sweetened beverages can increase the risk of gout and gout attacks, even though theyre not purine-rich (
16 ).
For instance, a study including over 125,000 participants found that people who consumed the most fructose had a 62% higher risk of developing gout .
On the other hand, research shows that low-fat dairy products, soy products and vitamin C supplements may help prevent gout attacks by reducing blood uric acid levels (
Summary: Foods can either raise or lower your uric acid levels, depending on their purine content. However, fructose can raise your uric acid levels even though it is not purine-rich.
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Foods That Are Good For Gout
In addition to avoiding common triggers, reaching for certain foods may also help ward off gout attacks:
Cherries: The fruits anti-inflammatory compounds may provide a protective effect. In one study, which tracked over 600 people with gout, cherry consumption over a two day period was associated with a 35% lower risk of gout attacks.
Dairy: Milk proteins have been shown to . So if youre a dairy lover, go ahead and enjoy your grass-fed yogurt and milk.
Coffee: Good news for java fans. A review of nine studies found that in both men and women, coffee can significantly lower uric acid levels. And drinking one cup per day or more was tied to a reduced gout risk.
Water: Staying well-hydrated is an important tactic for preventing gout because water is needed to help the kidneys flush out waste products, including excess uric acid. A good rule of thumb is to aim for 64 ounces of water, spread out throughout the day.
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