How to reduce uric acid

I recently came across a video from Dr. Perlmutter talking about uric acid and why it is important. Uric acid has been previously connected only to gout, but it is becoming clear that uric acid is a key player in weight gain, diabetes, heart disease and dementia.

Those of you who trained with me in the past know that I don’t support eating fruits every day if your goal is to burn body fat. Most fruits in nature are seasonal and ripen right before the cold times of the year. Nature designed it with purpose. My approach to weight loss is based on our human physiology that hasn’t changed significantly since our ancestors walked this earth. Dr. Pelmutter’s message correlates with my coaching principals. Here is his message:

“In America 88% of adults has at least 1 component of metabolic disfunction that can lead to cardiovascular disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, dementia, Alzheimer’s, etc. One of the key element in this pandemic is uric acid as it is directly involved in regulating our metabolism.

Many years ago, it was important for our ancestors for their survival to be insulin resistant, to make and store body fat to increase the blood pressure when they didn’t have water, faced dehydration and they didn’t know where their next meal is coming from. About 15 million years ago, our ancestors faced a phase when the earth became cooler. Various fruits, like figs, became less abundant and it was a survival pressure on our ancestors. A small group of the ancestors had a “superpower” – the ability to make and store body fat and raise their blood sugar to power their brains. The signal that made their bodies to do that was uric acid. Over time they developed “defect” in enzyme called uricase that would normally break down uric acid and allow them to excrete it. Without uricase these ancestors became little heavier (not obese) in comparison to the others who did not have the uricase mutation. And they were able to survive and pass it on. They needed elevated blood sugar to power their brains when they could not find food to avoid starvation and predation. That was our environment and our physiology. It worked very well in that environment. We inherited that legacy as a survival mechanism by having elevated uric acid.

Genetically we haven’t had any significant changes in our metabolic genes from our ancestors, but our environmental signals that we send to our bodies changed. It is important to realize that food sends information to our bodies, it is informing us as to the environment – fructose is telling our bodies winter is coming and the signaling mechanism is uric acid. It is screaming in our bodies get ready, if you want to survive, we will hep you make fat, store fat and raise blood sugar. Nowadays, with all the abundance of food, that signal is on 24/7 to get ready for winter that never comes. We are constantly telling our bodies prepare for food scarcity and now more than one third of Americans are obese. By 2030 it will be a half of Americans.

What is happening now is evolutionary environmental mismatch. We cannot change the gene part – nor should we, but we can certainly work on the relationship with the environment, we can change the signals to our physiology and stop telling our physiology to prepare for winter hence store fat and raise blood sugar. We can do that by turning off the signal and bring our uric acid under control. The raise of the uric acid levels from 3.5 mg per decilitre in 1920’s to todays average of 6 mg perfectly parallels our consumption of sugar and more recently the higher levels of fructose because of the developed technology to extract fructose and create high fructose corn sirup which is very sweet and inexpensive, and it is used in about 60% of packaged foods in our grocery stores. About 100 years ago, we were eating about 10 grams of fructose per day, equivalent to a small piece of fruit and that has quadrupled since then.

You can check the levels of uric acid at home with uric acid blood monitor or have the blood test done. You want to see your uric acid below 5.5 mg per decilitre. You might be told by your doctor your uric acid is ‘within the normal range’, which is something you don’t want because you want to be in optimal health. The normal range is considered to be 7 mg per decilitre or lower but that is not ideal. That number was derived because of the gout ignoring the other problems. It is above 7 when you can develop gout. But the cardio metabolic issues begin at 5.5. That is the level we want to keep out uric acid at or below. Preferably do not check it when you are fasting or after vigorous workout.

In 2018 study they followed 90,000 adults over 8 years found that those individuals who had their uric acid levels at 7 mg or greater, had 38% increased risk of cardiovascular mortality, and 32% increased risk of dying from stroke. Another similar study following people with for 12 years showed that those with uric acid at 7+ mg had 155% increased risk of any form of dementia, 55% increased risk of Alzheimer’s, and 80% increased risk of vascular dementia.

The biggest contributor to uric acid is fructose. You can eat a small piece of real fruit a day and be fine. But one glass of apple/orange juice for example is a big NO NO due to a huge amount of fructose which our bodies are not designed to deal with.

How does dehydration contribute to uric acid?

When the body thinks it is dehydrated, it stimulates the enzyme called aldose reductase which can convert your blood sugar into fructose telling your body to make and store fat because you are dehydrated. That is how a camel can walk across the desert, does not drink any water and yet does not get dehydrated. The secret is its hump which composes of up to 80 lbs of fat. When we burn fat we produce carbon dioxide and metabolic water, so making and storing body fat has been a powerful survival mechanism against dehydration. When you are dehydrated, your sodium is up, you stimulate aldose reductase, you convert glucose into fructose which leads into increased uric acid and signal to make and store fat to create metabolic water. You can increase you level of sodium just by eating a bag of chips – you get your sodium up and the next thing you know you are getting fat juts because you stimulated the survival pathway.”

Foods with high-fructose corn sirup:
• Fast food items, breakfast sandwiches
• Breakfast cereals
• Bread and baked goods
• Crackers
• Sweetened dairy products like yogurts
• Candies
• Canned foods like soups and fruit
• Soda, juice drinks
• Jelly, applesauce
• BBQ sauce
• Ketchup, cocktail sauce
• Maple syrup
• Steak sauce
• Some pasta sauces
• Packaged sweets
• Ice cream
• Some deli meats and salad dressings
• Some peanut butter, instant oatmeal, ramen noodles, granola bars……

So how can we decrease the level of uric acid?

Read food labels, avoid sugar in any form (mainly fructose), limit your sodium intake, drink plenty of water, take 500mg of quercetin a (supplement that has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects) per day and take vitamin C.

Source: Uric Acid: A KEY Cause of Weight Gain, Diabetes, Heart Disease & Dementia video: click here