Tag Archives: gout flares

dash diet for gout

Heart Diet Good for Gout

A diet that’s best known for promoting heart health may also help gout management. The Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet, which emphasizes fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains and low-fat dairy products, may lower serum uric acid (SUA) levels. In a study published in Clinical Rheumatology in March 2017,  research findings showed that the diet reduced SUA [compared to the typical American (control) diet] within 30 days, with a sustained effect at 90 days. In an earlier study reported in Arthritis & Rheumatology in August 2016, researchers reported similar finding in some cases.

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Wipe Out Gout

Arthritis Foundation Launches Wipe Out Gout – Awareness Campaign

It may come as a surprise that gout is the most common cause of inflammatory arthritis among adults in the United States.1 It’s also very painful, but gout can be a management disease – meaning there are several things people with gout can do to reduce flares, or eliminate flares all together.
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Gout Patient Story

“Honey, I Have Gout”: A Spouse Reflects on Her Worries

At times, life can be difficult for those living with gout, but it can be just as hard on spouses. When you live in close quarters with a significant other, you undoubtedly feel the pain they deal with on a daily basis. Mira knows this firsthand.

Early on in their marriage, Mira’s husband returned from a business trip with a painful toe and they couldn’t figure out the cause. “For someone who was athletic and never had any health problems, it was inexplicable,” says Mira. “That first attack lasted about a week, and we were young, so he didn’t go see a doctor.”
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New Gout Resource from Arthritis Foundation

Let’s Speak Gout: Addressing A Treatable, Yet Often Untreated Condition

Did you know that Gout Awareness Day is held on May 22? In support of Gout Awareness Day today, we’ve launched a new tool to help those that suffer from the disease. Of the nearly 8.3 million adults living with gout, more than half experience multiple gout attacks each year. But having fewer or no gout attacks is possible. The Arthritis Foundation’s Let’s Speak Gout patient tool is now available to empower you to better manage your disease.
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Gout Patient Story Football Player

Former Football Player Tackles Gout

As a former football player and wrestler who’d had three knee operations, Scott thought he knew pain. Then he had his first gout attack.

While the pain was new to him, Scott was familiar with gout because his dad had been living with it for 20 years. Gout, a form of inflammatory arthritis, develops in some people who have high levels of uric acid in the blood. The acid can form needle-like crystals in a joint and cause sudden, severe episodes of pain, , (tenderness and redness are not severe – focus on pain, warmth and swelling), warmth and swelling in the joints. For many people, including Scott, the first symptom of gout is excruciating pain and swelling in the big toe. Gout may also appear in another lower-body joint, such as the ankle or knee.

“Basically I described what happened, the doctor looked at my foot, told me I had gout and prescribed some pain medicine,” Scott says. “The pain medicine didn’t do much though. I stopped taking it after a few days and tried to manage around the pain.”
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Coffee Gout

Does Coffee Help or Hurt Gout?

Nearly two-thirds of Americans start their day with a cup or more of coffee. Besides its wake-up java jolt effect, coffee could be good for your health. Studies have linked regular coffee consumption with a lower risk for heart disease, some types of cancer, and type 2 diabetes, among other conditions.

Could your morning cup of Joe also help prevent bouts of painful gout? While some evidence suggests this popular beverage might help you avoid joint pain, the caffeine it contains might actually lead to more flare-ups if you already have gout.

Coffee and Gout Prevention

A 2007 study investigated the potential link between coffee intake and gout risk among nearly 46,000 men. The authors found that men who drank four to five cups of coffee a day had a 40 percent lower relative risk of gout compared to men who weren’t coffee drinkers. Decaf coffee also modestly lowered gout risk, but tea didn’t have any effect, suggesting that something other than caffeine is responsible for the effect on gout.
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