Gout causes extreme pain in those affected. It is caused by crystals of uric acid settling in the joints. Its treatment is a pharmaceutical success story. Nowadays, medicines treat it so effectively that patients can have an undisturbed quality of life.
Disease: Gout
Last update: July 2009
Intro
FAQ: What is it?
Gout results from too much uric acid in the blood. Eventually, crystals formed from uric acid settle in the joints and the kidney. This leads to arthritis and kidney stones. Gout is a very painful condition.
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What is it?
Gout results from too much uric acid in the blood. Eventually, crystals formed from uric acid settle in the joints and the kidney. This leads to arthritis and kidney stones. Gout is a very painful condition. -
Who gets it?
Men are more frequently affected than women. Patients may go without clinical symptoms for many years. It is estimated that 10 per cent of these will develop gout in the joints and arthritis. -
What can be done about it?
Special diets can help reduce the production of uric acid. Treating gout is one of the great successes of the pharmaceutical industry. Medicines have been developed which can abort acute attacks, prevent future attacks and reduce, long-term, the amount of uric acid in the blood. Correctly treated, patients with gout will have an undisturbed quality of life and normal life expectancy. -
What does the future hold?
Although the pace of research has slowed - because of the success of the available medicines - new compounds are being investigated. It is expected that these will be as effective but mean that the patient need take less medicine every day.
Dr. Trudy Elion and Dr. George Hitchins were awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine for their basic research on purine metabolism, that is an underlying cause of gout.