This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
Cigarette smoking associated with lower risk for gout in men
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
In an Asian cohort of men, cigarette smoking was associated with a lower risk for developing gout, but no differences in risk were observed in women, according to recently published research.
Researchers studied 2,244 incident cases of gout in the Singapore Chinese Health Study of 63,257 Chinese adults aged 45 to 74 years at baseline during a mean follow-up of 11.1 years. Cox proportional hazards models were used to identify the relationships between smoking, onset of gout and other factors.
Data collected included age, sex, history of tobacco use, BMI, physical activity levels, alcohol use, age at diagnosis, comorbidities such as hypertension or diabetes, and dietary habits.
Incident rates of gout were 502 per 100,000 person-years among men and 295 cases per 100,000 person-years among women.
Compared with never smokers, the risk for developing gout in current smokers was reduced by 20% among men, and the reduction was higher in lean men. Serum urate levels, analyzed in 486 participants, were lower in current smokers compared with former and never smokers, and the risk was the same as never smokers for men who were former smokers or recently quit smoking. Duration and intensity of smoking had no effect on the risk for developing gout among men, and no associations were observed among women regardless of smoking duration or intensity. The results were unchanged when adjusted for the presence of diabetes, hypertension, chronic heart disease or stroke.
Among 19,387 men with BMI data available, a marginally significant association with a higher risk for developing gout was observed in participants with a BMI greater than 25 kg/m2. – by Shirley Pulawski
Disclosure: The researchers report the study was funded by NIH.
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts