Gout can be very upsetting because of the sudden pain in the joints. Check yourself for gout symptoms foot before the pain gets more intense.
If you are male, you should be worried about any pain in the joints because this disease commonly affects the male population.
What is gout?
Gout is a metabolic arthritis that is characterized by redness, swelling and pain over the joints of the big toe.
However, some patients develop this disease on the instep of the foot, in the ankle or knee. Because the foot is affected, a patient may find it painful to wear shoes while moving or standing on foot.
Gout symptoms in the foot
The initial symptom that a person has this disease usually manifests on the big toe. In most cases, gout symptoms foot can be extremely painful. Numbing pain with red, hot and swollen feet manifest during an attack.
The area where there is a gout change in color and this is another gout symptoms foot. Ankle can also be affected. Sharp and agonizing pain in the ankle may be felt when you walk or move your affected foot.
Gout symptoms in the knee
Gout in the knees may be called acute gouty arthritis. This is the time when the gout symptoms involve more than one joints.
Nocturnal pains can be very painful and excruciating. The area affected is warm, red and often there is tenderness. Knee gout may result to serious destruction of the cartilages in the tissue joints.
Gout and high uric acid
This disease results from uric acid buildup in the body. This is also termed as hyperuricemia.
Accumulated uric acid happens when the body fails to eliminate the uric acid that has been synthesized from high purine foods. Normally, uric acids should have been eliminated through the kidneys and urine.
There are also cases when a person has a genetic predisposition to accumulate uric acid therefore becomes prone to acquiring the disease even without purine rich foods.
Categories of gout symptoms
Gout symptoms are categorized into three stages, namely asymptomatic hyperuricemia, acute intermittent gout and chronic tophaceous gout.
When there is an elevated uric acid in the blood but manifests no symptom at all, this is asymptomatic hyperuricemia stage.
Symptoms of swollen and joint pains belong to the acute intermittent gout stage. The swelling may subside without any treatment or in less time if treatment is given. Even when treated, the symptoms may still recur in few months or even years.
The last stage is chronic tophaceous gout. Attacks are frequent and the joints become inflamed and painful. Movements become inhibited because of the extreme pain not only in one area but in multiple joints.
The worse complication is because uric acid crystals are formed into kidney stones can also develop in the last stage of an attack.
The best way to avoid gout is to make sure you have low purine diet and to avoid purine rich foods. One of the most recommended cures is to drink cherry juice regularly or eat cherries to avoid attacks.
Cherries are believed to have anthrocyanins which lowers the amount of uric acid in the body.