A disease that many think has died out is actually on the rise. Gout is the most common form of inflammatory arthritis in men. Weight is not always an indicator of gout but the disease occurs more frequently in obese people which is on the rise says a clinical professor of family medicine at UW-Madison.
“As our waists have expanded our gout has also expanded,” says Dr. Zorba Paster.
A symptom is onset of severe pain in the big toe. A physician will be able to confirm immediately if you the disease, which is caused by excessive amounts of uric acid, a metabolic byproduct, in the joints.
Paster says there is also a rarely used method of injecting a needle into the big toe to measure for uric acid. The injection detection must happen two weeks after the flare up because immediately after the pain the uric acid moves to the joints.
Brian Moon reports (:63)
