How Can Gout Kill You?

How Gout can Kill You is my featured image for 21 Ways Gout Can Kill You. So here I list the 21 ways that gout can kill you. Followed by 4 ways that uric acid treatment can help avoid gout fatalities.

How Gout can Kill You image details

The original image is captioned
Possible mechanisms by which uric acid might mediate cardiovascular disease, hypertension, and kidney disease. CAD, coronary artery disease.

Possible mechanisms by which uric acid might mediate cardiovascular disease, hypertension, and kidney disease. CAD, coronary artery disease.

First, I took the original image from the gout and heart disease study:
Kanbay, Mehmet, Mark Segal, Baris Afsar, Duk-Hee Kang, Bernardo Rodriguez-Iturbe, and Richard J. Johnson. “The role of uric acid in the pathogenesis of human cardiovascular disease.” Heart (2013): heartjnl-2012.

Then I simplified the text boxes to focus on key causes of organ damage showing risks of disease and failure of kidneys, heart, and brain. So I will show the original text now for those of you interested in medical specifics.

How Gout can Kill You

For each of my added boxes, here is the original text:

High Uric Acid

The report centers on problems with excess uric acid. Medically, this is known as Hyperuricemia. There is no strict definition. But generally, rheumatologists take it to be over 7mg/dL. However, this might depend on personal circumstances. For example, if your job entails prolonged exposure to cold temperatures, then your personal definition of hyperuricemia might be over 5 mg/dL.

Brain Damage

The 4 uric acid risks of stroke and dementia are:

  • 1. Increases risk for stroke.
  • 2. Associated with poorer long-term outcome for stroke.
  • 3. May impair autoregulatory response of the cerebral arterioles.
  • 4. Increases risk for vascular dementia.

Heart Damage

The 5 uric acid causes of artery & heart disease are:

  • 5. Causes endothelial dysfunction.
  • 6. Increases oxidative stress.
  • 7. Causes microvascular disease.
  • 8. Induce vascuar smooth muscle cell proliferation.
  • 9. Causes a reduction in endothelial NO bioavailability.

Heart Disease

The 4 uric acid risks of heart failure are:

  • 10. Causes hypertension.
  • 11. Causes diastolic dysfunction.
  • 12. Associated with increased mortality in congestive heart failure and CAD (Coronary Artery Disease).
  • 13. Associated with cardiac microvascular disease and poor outcome following myocardial infarcation.

Kidney Damage

The 5 uric acid causes of kidney disease are:

  • 14. Causes activation of the renin-angiotensin system.
  • 15. Causes microvascular and inflammatory changes in the kidney.
  • 16. Impair the autoregulatory response of kidney.
  • 17. Causes interstitial macrophage and T-cell infiltration.
  • 18. Causes afferent arteriolopathy (disease of nerve signals from arterial blood vessels in the kidneys).

Kidney Disease

The 3 uric acid risks of kidney failure are:

  • 19. Causes kidney disease progression.
  • 20. Causes kidney allograft dysfunction.
  • 21. May be involved in preeclampsia.

Uric Acid Treatment

The 4 reduced uric acid improvements to brain, heart, and kidneys are:

  1. Decreases blood pressure.
  2. Improves kidney function.
  3. Decreases inflammation.
  4. Improves endothelial function (xanthine oxidase inhibition).

Leave How Gout can Kill You to read 21 Ways Gout Can Kill You.

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