Prompted by an interesting question, “Do endurance athletes get gout?“, I realized I mention exercise quite often, but I have not written a comprehensive view. I need to study gout & exercise more thoroughly to get better studies on controlled gout investigations, but here is a simple overview.

Before I look at at exercise, you must remember what gout is – a uric acid imbalance where excess uric acid forms crystals in joints and other body tissues. Of itself, and contrary to popular belief, it is not a dietary problem, though bad diet can make gout worse, and occasionally it is the only source of excess uric acid.

There is an important test, when first diagnosed with gout, but before uric acid lowering treatment starts. That test involves collecting urine over a 24 hour period, which is then analyzed for uric acid output. This tells you if you are an over-producer, or under-excreter. With this knowledge, managing exercise & gout together becomes easier. Whether you get this test or not, uric acid blood tests are vital. Exercise can affect gout in different ways, and if you do not know your precise uric acid level (a number, not a label), you will not be able to judge the benefits or pitfalls from your exercise program.
Continue reading about Gout & Exercise

At this time of year, I’m often in reflective mood.

Looking back at the past year’s achievements. Looking forward to next year’s challenges.

Today, I am mindful of the social aspects of gout. Who amongst us has avoided the laughter and derision when we share our goutful state within our social circle? We have even had gout forum contributors complain of their doctor’s diagnosis accompanied by gleeful laughter.

It’s not funny! Gout hurts.

But it also hurts and saddens me to see the attitudes to this most painful of health conditions. People perceive gout as some form of amusing self-harming. So we hang our heads in shame, complaining of age and arthritis, scared to mention the G word.

But this is wrong. We have to take charge, and tell the world about gout as a genetic metabolic problem. We need to play down the food aspects. Yes, food is an important consideration in gout treatment, but only as part of a proper gout management plan. Worrying about certain foods as gout triggers is pointless, and only confuses the important issues.

Worst of all is the appalling lack of understanding and valid treatment programs in the health industry. But I digress – let me get back to social issues.

I have come to realize that the only way to make significant changes is to share. So 2012 will be my year for broadening horizons, and pushing gout awareness to everyone who needs to understand it better. Now this is no gout awareness campaign pushed by huge pharmaceutical companies. Nor is it a network of snake oil salesmen striving to create misinformation so they can benefit with “secret reports” and “miracle cures.”

My gout support network will push the values of openness and honest helpfulness that have brought GoutPal to the forefront of gout support. And it all comes down to you.

I wrote earlier about the importance of you in improving gout support services for everyone. To get more people involved, I have pushed forward with two of the biggest social networks.

GoutPal On Facebook

I set up a GoutPal Facebook page some time ago, but never really got round to learning how to develop it properly. I have revamped it, and I want to improve it during 2012, but I heed your help.

Not only do I need you to Like my page, I also need your input about what to include on the page. At the moment, it is mainly a series of automatic posts from the GoutPal websites, but I am sure it can be a lot more than that. I do not want to detract from the gout forums on GoutPal Interactive, so I am not keen on using it for questions and answers. What would you like to see there?

Also, Facebook has a blog following service. Is that useful, or would you prefer my regular email/RSS update service?

Follow this blog

GoutPal On Google Plus

Google have been keen to ride on the success of Facebook, and introduced a Google Plus service, where I have recently added a GoutPal page.

This service is very new to me, and I have yet to explore it’s potential. Have you used it? Like Facebook, what do you think is the best way to promote gout awareness through Google Plus pages? I have added PlusOne badges to the top and bottom of all pages here – have you shared your favorite pages with the rest of the world yet?

Reclaim Social Space For Good Gout Support

I’m unsure how successful my network expansion plans will be, but I am certain of one worrying fact. The online world of gout continues to be manipulated by self-serving pharmaceutical companies masquerading as information sources and self-serving snake-oil salesmen masquerading as reliable product sources. They have taken over Facebook, and I see that Google Plus will be the next target. With your help, we can stop this abuse of social networks by sharing the good stuff.

If you have ideas or questions about expanding the gout support network, please share them in the GoutPal Improvements Forum.

For the last 3 years, there has been interesting news about Dual Energy Computed Tomography for gout diagnosis.

Each year, roughly coinciding with annual rheumatologist meetings, we have seen reports of the amazing ability to see uric acid crystals in places previously hidden. This year is no exception.

Whilst the latest report shows that DECT is not the ultimate gout diagnostic tool for all situations, it does have a firm place in the rheumatologist’s toolkit.

I have reported on DECT For Gout Diagnosis earlier, and there are several more references, which you can find by entering DECT into the search box above. The latest report was presented at ACR Annual Scientific Meeting in November 2011, and the abstract follows.
Find out When Is DECT Best For Gout Diagnosis?

I have hinted at new services to extend the depth and reach of my gout support services.

From my clear realization that better gout support services depend on you, I now have a clearer vision of how gout support services can improve. There are many opportunities for helping gout sufferers fix gout quicker, and there are many opportunities for gout patients to improve their own knowledge and understanding.

Though I will introduce several new gout support service improvements through 2012, now is a good time to lay the foundation for networking these services so that they grow quicker from our collective efforts.

You can be involved in the GoutPal network in many different ways.

Though I listed several opportunities in my earlier article, there are many other ways to contribute to a global gout support network. The expected benefits or rewards are:

• Knowledge
• Rewards
  • Sell your products and services
  • Earn commission on 3rd party products and services
  • Earn advertising revenue
• Influence
  • Promote your own business
  • Promote a good cause or charity

How can you contribute to the global gout support network?

In my last post about improving gout support services, I touched upon the value of other contributors. I’ve also realized the vital importance of involving other people. I’ve realized how writing about your gout can help you understand and fix your own gout, as I am doing with mine.

Improving Yourself With Gout Support

There are many ways to improve your health, your wealth, or both.

• Ask great gout questions.
• Provide helpful gout and uric acid answers.
• Share gouty arthritis experiences and opinions.
• Link your contributions to:
  • Charities
  • Product/service commissions (affiliate schemes)
  • Advertising programs
  • Your own web business
• Write guest articles.
• Build your own website.

If you have the knowledge to do any of the above, I’ll be publishing detailed guidelines of how you can get involved. If you cannot wait for that, please submit your proposals privately via my Contact Form, or publicly through my gout support improvement service.

If you have no writing or publishing knowledge, please do not worry. The Health Writing School is on it’s way, and it will support you in realizing your dreams for earning whilst learning about gout (or any other subject that interests you). Again, if you cannot wait, use the links above to tell me why I should involve you now. I’d much rather build the training facilities with some volunteer trainees than plan everything in splendid isolation. If you do not mind a few rough edges, let me know why you want to help provide better health support services, and we will get started straight away.

Pathways To Better Gout Support

I am developing the pathways for you to get involved with gout support services. I have hinted at these in the list above, and to be more specific, the outline is:

1. Learn to contribute by using the new gout forum, or show me your work elsewhere.
2. Contribute to debates, and earn links to other websites, revenue generating schemes, or charities/community services
3. Write guest articles on this website
4. Work with me to develop yoursite.goutpal.net

I will kick off with the first of what I hope is many guest articles very very soon. If you do not want to miss it, be sure to sign-up for the free update service:

Knowing the causes of gout is usually linked with gout symptoms and diagnosis. I used to have separate sections for these, but now the Gout Symptoms Section covers all these. I reproduce the introduction to the old Gout Causes section below, to maintain links to some useful articles about what causes gout.

In this section I show

• How uric acid causes gout.
• How excess uric acid occurs.
• How excess uric acid leads to gout pain.

Learn more about Causes Of Gout

The project to move the acid/alkaline food lists continues. I have moved the table of PRAL values for sausages and luncheon meats, referred to below, to a new food diary project. I have retained the introduction here, as it contains some useful gout diet information about sausages and luncheon meats.

Let me tell you why these types of processed meats can be bad food for gout. It’s the “p” word – processed. Though a well-made sausage can be nutritious, and may contain additives that make it less acid producing than a similar portion of pure meat, you need to be careful with all processed foods
Continue reading Bad Food For Gout