Gout Symptoms – Symptoms and Causes

What Is Gout

Gout is a type of arthritis that causes sudden, intense pain attacks. These attacks often happen at night and typically affect the big toe. The pain comes with swelling, redness, and extreme tenderness in the affected joint.

When gout flares up, the joint becomes hot and swollen. Many people find that even light pressure, like a bedsheet touching the area, can cause severe pain.

Key features of gout:

• Sudden onset of pain
• Swelling and redness
• Extreme tenderness in joints
• Most commonly affects the big toe
• Pain may wake you at night

While gout symptoms often come and go, they can be managed. With proper treatment and lifestyle changes, people can reduce how often flares happen and lessen their severity.

Signs and Symptoms

Gout attacks typically start without warning, often waking people from their sleep.

Common symptoms include:

• Severe joint pain – Usually affects the big toe, but can also appear in ankles, knees, elbows, wrists, and fingers. Pain is most intense during the first 4–12 hours.

• Prolonged discomfort – Joint pain may continue for days or weeks after the worst pain eases. Future attacks often last longer and spread to more joints.

• Swelling and redness – Affected joints become swollen, tender, warm, and red.

• Reduced movement – As the condition progresses, joint mobility may decrease.

When Medical Help Is Needed

Contact a healthcare provider if sudden, severe joint pain develops. Untreated gout can cause worsening pain and permanent joint damage.

Get immediate medical attention if fever occurs with a hot, inflamed joint, as this might indicate an infection.

Causes

Gout happens when urate crystals build up in joints, causing swelling and severe pain during attacks. These crystals form when there is too much uric acid in the blood, which occurs when the body breaks down purines.

Several foods contain high levels of purines:

• Red meat
• Organ meats (like liver)
• Certain seafood (anchovies, sardines, mussels, scallops, trout, tuna)

Drinks that can increase uric acid include:

• Alcoholic beverages, particularly beer
• Beverages sweetened with fructose (fruit sugar)

In a healthy system, uric acid dissolves in the blood and leaves through the kidneys in urine. However, two main problems can lead to gout:

1. Overproduction: The body makes too much uric acid.
2. Poor Elimination: The kidneys don’t remove enough uric acid.

When an issue arises, uric acid levels increase and can create sharp, needle-like urate crystals that gather in joints or surrounding tissues. These crystals trigger the painful inflammation and swelling typical of gout attacks.

Risk Factors

Several factors can increase your chances of developing gout by raising uric acid levels in your body:

Dietary Choices

• Red meat and shellfish consumption
• Drinks with fructose (fruit sugar)
• Alcohol intake, especially beer

Body Weight

Excess weight makes your body produce more uric acid while making it harder for your kidneys to remove it.

Health Conditions

Your risk increases if you have:

• Untreated high blood pressure
• Diabetes
• Obesity
• Metabolic syndrome
• Heart disease
• Kidney disease

Medications

Some medicines can raise uric acid levels, including:

• Low-dose aspirin
• Blood pressure medications (thiazide diuretics, ACE inhibitors, beta-blockers)
• Anti-rejection drugs used after organ transplants

Genetic Factors

If gout runs in your family, you have a higher chance of developing it yourself.

Age and Gender

Men typically develop gout more often and earlier (between ages 30–50) than women. Women’s risk increases after menopause when their uric acid levels become similar to men’s.

Recent Physical Stress

Some people may experience gout attacks following:

• Surgery
• Physical injury
• Vaccination

Complications

Without proper treatment, gout can lead to several serious health issues. These issues may affect quality of life and overall health.

Recurrent Gout

• Repeated gout attacks that recur several times per year
• Can be managed with proper medication
• If left untreated, gout can damage and destroy joints

Tophi Formation

When gout remains untreated, urate crystals can build up under the skin, forming lumps called tophi. These typically appear in:

• Fingers and hands
• Feet
• Elbows
• Achilles tendons

While tophi are usually not painful day-to-day, they often become swollen and tender during gout attacks.

Kidney Stones

Urate crystals may collect in the urinary tract, forming painful kidney stones. These stones can:

• Causes severe pain
• Block urine flow
• Lead to urinary tract infections
• Damage kidney function over time