Taipei City Hospital

Currently, the improvement in living standard and the gradual westernization of dietary habit have made gout a familiar disease to us. According to the epidemiological investigation, patients with hyperuicemia in Taiwan have exceeded two million. By estimating that about 10 percent of these patients will suffer from gout in their lives, it means the number of patients suffering from gout may be more than 200 thousand. Moreover, there is an increased tendency of young people suffering from gout in recent years, especially males in their twenties to forties.

Yan-Lin Wu, attending doctor of the Rheumatology Department in Taipei City Hospital, says that some research reports at home and abroad have found successively in recent years that hyperuicemia is an independent risk factor of total brain death or cardiovascular death, which tends to rise with the increase of serum uric acid. American veterans with hyperuicemia use allopurinol to reduce the uric acid, and the observational study shows that reducing the concentration of serum uric acid with drugs helps to decrease the total brain death rate.

Therefore, the influences caused by increased serum uric acid concentration and gout on the body are not only limited to joint pains. Treating chronic gout with uric-acid-lowering drugs can not only reduce the recurrence of acute arthritis, but also bring additional benefits for treating cardiovascular diseases. Whether the patients with symptomless hyperuicemia can take uric-acid-lowering drugs to reduce the risk of total brain death or cardiovascular death still awaits further research and assessment.