Gout Diet Category

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.
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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
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Whilst moving some of my food tables to a more nutritionally intense food diary website, I researched what was attracting so many visitors to these charts. I was amazed by how many visitors arrived at this website after searching for gout and a food item, or a food item and gout. Occasionally, the search takes a different form, but the lack of awareness about the importance of all food, drink, and exercise in the gout diet, and the futility of focusing on a single food item, becomes even more obvious with a question like “Are honey nut cheerios bad for gout?”

To prove a point, the most popular quest is for information about gout and tomatoes. I have had the argument with many a gout sufferer who believes that tomatoes cause gout. They do not.

The only thing that causes gout is an excess of uric acid. Whilst many things, including some foods, affect uric acid, tomatoes do not increase uric acid, therefore they cannot cause gout. So why do people worry about the effects of tomatoes on gout? Why do they think tomatoes might cause gout?

The answer lies in my recent article about the gout treatment pain assessment myth.
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As reported earlier, I have moved the table of PRAL values for fats and oils, referred to below, to a new food diary project. I have retained the introduction here, as it contains some useful gout diet information about fats and oils.

You normally take fats and oils in such small amounts, that they don’t play a large part in your diet. You could almost ignore this table, except that oils in salad dressings, and fats in cooking can add up. Even then, as fats and oils are mainly neutral in their effect on pH levels, they can still be ignored in an alkalizing diet.
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I have moved the Spices and Herbs acid-alkaline food chart to my new food diary website. I reproduce the introductory notes here, but please remember that alkalizing your diet has negligible effect on uric acid levels, though it can prevent kidney stones forming.

The gout food in the spices and herbs table is predominantly alkaline. Dried coriander leaf is the most alkaline at -99. The most acid food is yellow mustard seed at 14.
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The dairy and egg acid-alkaline food table is the first I have moved to my food diary website. I retain the introductory notes here, as these are most relevant to gout sufferers.

Instead of trying to find specific gout food to not eat, you need to look at your whole diet. Dairy and egg products are a better source of protein than meat or fish for gout sufferers. Don’t forget though, that what you eat will become meat in the form of your body tissue. You need to feed your body in a healthy way, or this tissue will breakdown and worsen your gout.
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I will now complete reorganizing the Gout Diet section by moving all the detailed nutritional information to a separate food diary website. This should reduce some confusion regarding certain aspects of the role that food plays in managing gout.

Under the old scheme, I used the “gout food to avoid” label to refer to acidic foods, but this led to confusion on two counts.

• Confusion between an acid-alkaline balanced diet and uric acid.
• Confusion about avoiding all acid forming foods.

Under the new scheme, I will use the “gout food to avoid” label to refer to excess calories. These are always bad for gout because excess calories leads to excess body tissue – the main source of uric acid, and it also leads to excess weight, which adds to the load on gout-ridden joints.

Although food is not as important to gout as many people believe, there is always a case for good nutrition. Many gout sufferers have other health conditions that can be improved by diet, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart problems being particularly common. Planning a good diet should always start with an assessment of current nutrition, hence my decision to develop a separate food diary website.
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