Gout is a rare disease. The person who has fallen ill with him experiences severe suffering. A detailed explanation of what kind of gout disease, what its symptoms are and how it is treated, will give our material.
Causes of gout
Gout is a kind of joint disease, the root cause of which is the deposition of salts . This is due to metabolic disorders, uric acid accumulates in the joints, which ultimately leads to the destruction of the joint tissues. The physiological causes of the deposition of sodium urate crystals (as uric acid is called in a scientific environment) are:
- a large amount of uric acid in the body, which healthy kidneys do not have time to remove;
- uric acid is produced normally, but the diseased kidneys do not cope with its output.
According to medical statistics, elderly men are more likely to suffer gout, but sometimes women become ill after the onset of menopause. Medical workers note that in recent decades the number of patients with gout has increased significantly and continues to increase. This is due to the fact that more and more people are eating wrong: they eat food rich in purines, especially fatty meat and fish, and also abuse alcohol. In addition, experts are convinced that there is a hereditary predisposition: the risk of getting gout at times is higher in those people whose parents suffered from the deposition of salts.
Gout Disease - Symptoms and Treatment
Although the second name of gout is "illness of kings", the disease is not aristocratic at all. The affected joints swell, the adjacent skin becomes crimson, there is hyperthermia in the joint area. In this case, there are severe pains in the damaged joint. As a rule, gouty attacks occur at night after a plentiful libation and overeating. The attack of gout can last several days, but now there are medications that reduce pain and eliminate other symptoms of the disease.
A typical manifestation of a chronic disease are tofusi - accumulations of salt crystals, which are easy to grope in the places of small joints, mainly fingers and toes.
Treatment for gout has two main directions.
The first of them is the interruption of a gouty attack. At the first manifestation of the disease, the patient is placed in the rheumatology department of the clinic. This is necessary to accurately establish the diagnosis and differentiation of gout from other diseases with a similar pattern of leakage, including from reactive arthritis. In the future, seizures can be removed in a home environment. To do this, apply:
- Nonsteroid drugs (Ibuprofen, Diclofenac, Naproxen, etc.) These drugs relieve inflammation and reduce pain.
- Glucocorticoids - injections of hormonal drugs (Betamethasone, Methylprednisolone) into the area of inflamed joints.
- Colchicine is an effective medicine that not only eliminates inflammation, but also helps restore the function of the damaged joint.
The second direction of gout therapy is the normalization of metabolic processes in the body. This type of treatment is carried out in a "quiet" period, when there is no exacerbation of the disease. To reduce the formation of uric acid salts, the patient is recommended to take special drugs, for example, Allopurinol. Also, drugs that enhance the excretion of uric acid salts from the body can be prescribed.
The mandatory component of treatment for gout is diet. A number of products are excluded from the patient's diet. Among them:
- red meat;
- fish of fatty varieties;
- leguminous crops;
- cheese;
- alcohol.
Knowing why there is an unenviable disease of kings - gout, you can prevent its occurrence, if you adhere to the foundations of proper nutrition.