Over the last 40 years, the burden of gout, a painful inflammatory arthritis, has risen considerably, now affecting millions of Americans. In fact, gout is now the most common inflammatory arthritis in men and older women.
In my video, Gout Treatment with a Cherry on Top, I profiled new research, suggesting that even as few as a half of a cup of cherries a day may significantly lower the risk of gout attacks. Fresh cherries aren’t always in season, though. There are some alternatives. Frozen cherries appeared second-best and cherry juice concentrate is the runner-up. But does concentrated cherry juice actually help prevent attacks of gout?
The first pilot study was a randomized controlled trial cherry juice concentrate with pomegranate juice concentrate as a control for the prevention of attacks in gout sufferers who were having as many as four attacks a month. The cherry group got a tablespoon of cherry juice concentrate twice a day for four months, and the control group got a tablespoon of pomegranate juice concentrate twice a day for four months.
The number of gout flares in the cherry group dropped from an average of five down to two, better than the pomegranate group, which only dropped from about five to four. And about half of those in the cherry group who were on prescription anti-inflammatory drugs were able to stop their medications within two months after starting the cherry juice, as opposed to none of the patients in the pomegranate group.
The second study, highlighted in my video, Treating Gout with Cherry Juice, was a retrospective investigation over a longer term. Twenty-four gout patients went from having about seven attacks a year, down to two. The researchers concluded that cherry juice concentrate is efficacious for the prevention of gout flares. Large, long-term randomized controlled trials are needed to further evaluate the usefulness of cherries and cherry juice concentrate for gout flare prophylaxis.
So, are cherries now ripe for use as a complementary therapeutic in gout? One commentator “is of the opinion that the current state of evidence remains insufficient to formally recommend cherry fruit or cherry products as complementary therapeutic remedy for gout.” This commentator is also a paid consultant of nine different drug companies, all of which manufacture gout medications. I understand how the pharmaceutical industry can get nervous seeing studies where half of patients were able to stop taking their gout drugs given the billions of dollars at stake, but what’s the downside of eating a half cup of cherries a day, or worst comes to worst a few spoonfuls of cherry juice?
Here are the other videos I’ve done on the power of cherries to control inflammation:
Tart cherries (the kind people make pies out of, not the sweet kind) may also help with sleep (Tart Cherries for Insomnia).
What do you do with frozen cherries? I just eat them straight—suck on them like popsicles.
Another way to help treat gout is to drink lots of water and keep one’s urine alkaline by eating lots of dark green leafy vegetables (see Testing Your Diet with Pee & Purple Cabbage).
In health,
Michael Greger, M.D.
PS: If you haven’t yet, you can subscribe to my free videos here and watch my live year-in-review presentations Uprooting the Leading Causes of Death, More Than an Apple a Day, From Table to Able, and Food as Medicine.
