HOW I BEAT MY GOUT - AND YOU CAN TOO
  • How I Beat My Gout - And How You Can Too
  • Moving foot muscles to beat gout
  • Why Go On A Diet - And How
  • Who Is Benessere Watertree?
  • Disclaimer - Not Medical Information
  • Alternative Medicines For Gout
  • Where does uric acid come from?
  • What are purines
  • Forbidden Gout Foods
  • Food for gout sufferers - tasting better than your old diet
  • The inflammation is causing the pain
  • The Danger Of Being Fat
  • What to do when the diet gets boring
  • Great foods for gout-beaters
  • Why Drinking Lots Of Water Works
  • The Goutbeater Program
  • What To Do When You Have A Gout Attack
  • Why Milk Flushes Out Uric Acid
  • The Signup Page
  • The Goutbeater Blog
  • Do Cherries Work Against Gout?
  • Why gout happens in your big toe
  • How much uric acid does your body contain?
  • Unboxing the UASure uric acid meter
  • Can you change the pH of your urine - and does it matter?
  • Why you should avoid sugar
  • Two weeks of measuring my uric acid
  • Your Heart And Gout
  • The Daily UA Variation
  • Low Uric Acid Recipes
  • Gout-Friendly Weight Loss Recipes
  • Why Fish Oil Has No Effect On Gout, And How I Know
  • Trying Apple Cider Vinegar
  • Gout-Friendly Recipes
  • Three months of measuring my uric acid
  • How Did The Apple Cider Vinegar Test Go?
  • The Purine-Free Beers Of Japan
  • Six Months Of Measuring My Uric Acid
  • The Daily Goutbeating Routine
  • Do Celery Seeds Protect Against Gout?
  • Going OMAD

How drinking water can help you beat gout

Glass of water illustrating how you can reduce the risk of gout attacks and gout flare-ups by reducing the concentration of uric acid and the risk of monosodium urate crystal formation.
Drinking lots of water helps reduce the risk of gout attacks.
Drinking lots of water. When you have a gout attack and am willing to try anything, including amputation, you will willingly chug gallons if it helps even a little. But does it? And why?
DRINK MORE THAN A GALLON A DAY
Drinking water helps during a gout attack for the same reason as it helps to prevent attacks. You do not have to chug a gallon of water as a preventive measure, but you should try to drink at a big glass of water (approximately 300 cc, or one third of a liter) every 20 minutes. This spreads out the consumption and helps your body use the water. Drinking too much water may be bad for you, so try to drink about six liters a day (a gallon is about four liters, so this comes down to one and a half gallon per day).
HELP FLUSH THE KIDNEYS
The water helps against gout in two ways: It helps your kidneys flush out the excess uric acid, and it helps increase the volume of your blood. This may sound drastic but it is actually not a problem since we are only talking about a proportionally small increase, less than 20%. But increasing the volume from 4.5 liters to 5.5 liters (about 1.2 gallons) will decrease the concentration of uric acid in your blood, which means it becomes more difficult for uric acid crystals to form and less probable that you get a gout attack.
LOWER YOUR CONCENTRATION
During the attack it works the same way. Decreasing the concentration of uric acid in your blood means new crystals will not form and more importantly during an attack, the lower concentration means existing crystals will start to dissolve. And the extra water helps fush them out. Rather than being a lod on your kidneys, it helps them if you keep well hydrated. So does keeping your salt intake down. Otherwise, it can help make attacks last longer since you retain water in your body rather than flush it out.
HOW TO DRINK LOTS OF WATER
Some people have problems drinking lots of water. And while soft drinks are forbidden and diet sodas ate doubtful, there are some tricks you can try to stay hydrated.
Try either drinking a glass every 20 minutes, drink after you went to the toilet, a glass before, during, and after every meal, a glass with every cup of coffee or tea you have - as long as it becomes a routine you will not notice. Tea in itself counts, as does coffee, although as a diuretic it might make you go to the toilet more often than you had planned.
To make the water more appetizing, add in something unsweetened (lemon, apple cider vinegar, cherry juice). Or slice cucumber into the water and let it soak, or add herbs and let them soak. Mint gives the water a completely different flavor.
Or try changing one meal for soup and making it thin so you have to eat a lot. Milk also has a proven effect against uric acid, that may be another option (in the clinical trial they drank 8 big glasses per day). So there are many ways of staying hydrated.
Read more about related topics on these pages:
* What is uric acid?
* How much uric acid do you have in your body?
* What are purines and how do they become uric acid?
* Can you change the pH of your urine?
* What food should you avoid if you have gout?
​* What can you eat and how tasty is it?
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Never believe medical advice from a software engineer. Always read the disclaimer and talk to your doctor.
Links on this site may be affiliate links, which helps me keep it available since I get a small amount when you buy anything, and provides you with great products. Please note that advertisements are not automatically endorsed. Only when I explicitly say so. 
If you want to know more about what you can do about your gout and how to make sure you never have a flareup again, try reading my little book "Gout Simply Explained" which chronicles the research I did and what I found out. It is quite simple, really. 
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  • How I Beat My Gout - And How You Can Too
  • Moving foot muscles to beat gout
  • Why Go On A Diet - And How
  • Who Is Benessere Watertree?
  • Disclaimer - Not Medical Information
  • Alternative Medicines For Gout
  • Where does uric acid come from?
  • What are purines
  • Forbidden Gout Foods
  • Food for gout sufferers - tasting better than your old diet
  • The inflammation is causing the pain
  • The Danger Of Being Fat
  • What to do when the diet gets boring
  • Great foods for gout-beaters
  • Why Drinking Lots Of Water Works
  • The Goutbeater Program
  • What To Do When You Have A Gout Attack
  • Why Milk Flushes Out Uric Acid
  • The Signup Page
  • The Goutbeater Blog
  • Do Cherries Work Against Gout?
  • Why gout happens in your big toe
  • How much uric acid does your body contain?
  • Unboxing the UASure uric acid meter
  • Can you change the pH of your urine - and does it matter?
  • Why you should avoid sugar
  • Two weeks of measuring my uric acid
  • Your Heart And Gout
  • The Daily UA Variation
  • Low Uric Acid Recipes
  • Gout-Friendly Weight Loss Recipes
  • Why Fish Oil Has No Effect On Gout, And How I Know
  • Trying Apple Cider Vinegar
  • Gout-Friendly Recipes
  • Three months of measuring my uric acid
  • How Did The Apple Cider Vinegar Test Go?
  • The Purine-Free Beers Of Japan
  • Six Months Of Measuring My Uric Acid
  • The Daily Goutbeating Routine
  • Do Celery Seeds Protect Against Gout?
  • Going OMAD