Diet Coke and Gout – Is There a Link?

Welcome back! I'm so glad that you're finding "Natural Gout Remedies" so useful. John Cielo

Trying to prove a link between diet coke and gout either way is difficult. Company scientists say no, whilst other researchers say yes. And gout sufferers tell conflicting stories as well; some saying they stopped their regular gout after changing to diet coke from classic coke, others saying that their gout only started after going on to diet coke.

The problem is that there are many underlying reasons for raised uric acid levels leading to the urate crystal formation that causes gout. Unless you carry out long term studies with a sufficiently large group of people and carefully filter out all the other causes of high uric acid, then the test results cannot be relied on.

What is a fact though is that diet coke contains Aspartame, which is a non-calorific sweetener, in general use in soft drinks and food preparations since the 1980’s. And, although it has been passed by various governing bodies worldwide, there is a huge debate going on about potential serious side effects such as epilepsy and brain tumours. Although nothing has been proved scientifically as yet as far as I am aware.

But there is some evidence from a recent study that shows that sweet drinks, such as normal coke, which contain high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) as the sweetener DO lead to a higher risk of gout. So, in terms of trying to prevent gout, you may want to seriously consider avoiding normal coke and similar drinks that contain HFCS. 

But does this mean that you should stick to / change to diet coke? As I said at the start, there probably isn’t enough evidence to conclude one way or the other whether there is a link between diet coke and gout. Maybe the best option for you as a gout sufferer is to avoid diet coke and similar non-calorific sweetener drinks?

And there are many other issues that are well known to help cause the high uric acid levels in your body that lead to gout. So your time would probably be better spent working on what we DO know rather than what we DON’T know… 

For example, we DO know that some of the most important underlying causes of high uric acid are; being overweight, regular and excessive alcohol consumption, high-purine diet, family history of gout / arthritis and hypertension (high blood pressure), some medications, some medical conditions, high levels of fats (lipids) in the bloodstream. 

You’ll find more information on these issues, and, a more holistic approach to preventing the permanent joint damage and other health problems that can occur with frequently recurring gout attacks, by downloading The Gout Remedy Report. Just click here.

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What Type of Diet Helps Get Rid of Gout?

Generally speaking, the type of diet that helps get rid of gout is a diet low in purines. And what are purines? I hear you ask. They are natural chemical compounds that are found in foods in varying concentrations. They are a critical part of the metabolizing process that helps turn your food into energy and genes into protein among other things.

But they also produce uric acid as a result of this process. Your kidneys then process the uric acid in your blood and excrete the excess out of your body, retaining just enough in your blood, because uric acid is a valuable antioxidant.

However, high uric acid levels — a condition known as hyperuricemia — can cause uric acid crystals to form in your joints causing a gout attack.

And high acid levels can be caused by your kidneys not working to their full potential and / or too much uric acid being produced in your body by purine metabolizing. Either way you have too much uric acid in your blood. 

So, if you suffer from gout, you need to reduce your acid levels, and since it is produced by purines, you need to reduce the amount of purines in your body. And as food contains purines, you need to avoid those foods that have high and very high purine content. Generally speaking these are fatty red meats, offal (organ meat), game, seafood and poultry.

You need to replace these with more vegetables, fruits, complex carbohydrates, low fat dairy produce, essential fatty acids, foods with high vitamin C, and, natural supplements to help replace the vitamins, minerals and nutrients that you’ll miss when you change to a low-purine diet.

I’ve covered diet in another post in this website, so for a more detailed listing of the type of diet that helps get rid of gout, please go to High Uric Acid Foods to Avoid if You Have Gout.

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