Have You Had A Uric Acid Blood Test?
Uric acid blood tests are essential to managing gout.
We need uric acid tests to help diagnose gout properly, and to help get the correct dose when we are prescribed uric acid lowering treatment.
But there are several flaws in the usual procedures, including one flaw that completely devastates the effectiveness of testing.
Regular readers will know I am at the early stages of a campaign to improve uric acid testing procedures. I will explain the flaws in current procedures in more detail when I launch that campaign. They include:
- Failure to identify at-risk gout patients and apply an annual test schedule
- Failure to recognize the importance of testing frequently during urate lowering treatment
- Most importantly, failure to understand that the labs statistical assessment using a mathematical model of normal distribution does not mean that “normal” uric acid levels are necessarily healthy [1]
For my campaign to be most effective, I need facts. Now is the time for all gout sufferers to pull together and let the medical profession know clearly where they have to improve procedures. With your help, I can compile the information we need to ensure the campaign spells out the extent of the problem, and the simplicity of the solution.
In short, I need your latest blood test result.
Now, I do not want you to share confidential medical information. I am collecting the information anonymously. Having said that, I have put the poll and surveys in the members area of GoutPal Interactive to protect them from Internet spammers. I’m still looking at ways of making access available to everyone without registering, but I suspect that the registration process is our best chance of keeping the information as clean as it can be.
Please help the cause by:
- Reading the discussion guidelines, especially the gout debating guidelines and the gout poll guidelines.
- Read my introduction to the debate on Uric Acid Blood Testing, adding your comments and opinions where applicable.
- Complete the polls and surveys referred to in that debate.
Please complete the poll even if you have not had a uric acid test, if you are a gout sufferer or suspect you may have gout. I am very interested in learning about difficulties people have in getting this simple test, so please join the debate to explain your situation.
Uric Acid Blood Test References
- A normal distribution is:
The usual “bell shaped” distribution which may or may not be due to Carl Friedrich Gauss 1777-1855. Called “normal” because it is similar to many real-world distributions. Note that real-world distributions can be similar to normal, and still differ from it in serious systematic ways. …
ciphersbyritter.com/NOISE/NOISGLOS.HTM