Home Remedies For Gout Choice: Water

Of all home remedies for gout, water is the cheapest, and often the most effective.

Maintaining adequate hydration helps reduce uric acid concentration, which helps prevent gout attacks. Drinking lots of water also helps most other gout treatments - medical or alternative.

The kidneys play a vital role in gout management. Drinking plenty of water helps the kidneys flush uric acid from the body. Even if you take allopurinol to inhibit uric acid production, you still need water. It helps the kidneys get rid of the by-products of allopurinol. All medical or home remedies for gout that reduce uric acid will work better if you drink plenty of water.

One of the most common triggers for gout attacks is dehydration. As the body loses water, the concentration of uric acid rises in the blood. Once this reaches a critical point, uric acid crystals will form. You can easily prevent this by including water as at least one of your home remedies for gout.

Water as a Home Remedy for Gout

To use water as a home remedy for gout you need to drink at least 12 8-ounce glasses per day (5 UK pints, or almost 3 liters). This can take some getting used to, but if you persevere for a week or two, you soon get used to it. I try to drink about 25% more than that, and only seem to get gout attacks when I lose the water drinking habit. You need to increase this during hot weather or exercise.

Treat water as a medicine. Take a regular dose - sip from your glass or bottle regularly rather than guzzling a large volume each hour. You're not likely to overdose - you have to drink over a gallon an hour to risk adverse effects. You do need to take care that there are no impurities in the water. If your supply is not clean opt for bottled or properly filtered water.

Water is best taken pure, but milk, juices etc are also effective. Most fluids can be included as part of your water intake, including the water content of food. Some drinks contain caffeine or other diuretics. Do not include these as part of your water intake. If you drink lots of tea, coffee, cola or other diuretic drinks, you should increase your water consumption to compensate.

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