Cherries And Cherry Juice Gout Cures
A message from a reader today prompts me to revisit my Cherry Juice Gout page.
The message was about how the reader uses cherries to help gout. More about that later, but first correction of an omission.
I wrote about “Later reports”, without mentioning what they were. The studies include:
- Jacob, Robert et al. Consumption of Cherries Lowers Plamsa Urate in Healthy Women. Journal of Nutrition. 2003 Jun;133(6):1826-9.
- Antioxidant and antiinflammatory activities of anthocyanins and their aglycon, cyanidin, from tart cherries. Journal of natural products 1999 May;62(5):802.
- Consumption of Bing Sweet Cherries Lowers Circulating Concentrations of Inflammation Markers in Healthy Men and Women. Journal of Nutrition 2006 Apr 136: 981-986.
- Cyclooxygenase inhibitory and antioxidant cyanidin glycosides in cherries and berries. Phytomedicine. 2001 Sep;8(5):362-9.
I’ve listed these now on my Cherry Juice Gout page. If you hear about any other interesting studies about cherries or cherry juice (gout related), please let me know.
Of course, none of this means that cherry juice is a cure for gout. I have not noticed significant benefits myself. Reactions will vary from person to person. The anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant properties of cherries should make them beneficial as part of a well balanced diet.
Your Cherry and Cherry Juice Gout Cures
I’m hoping more people will let me know how they use cherries.
What type?
Raw, cooked or juice?
Interesting cherry recipes?
Also see Gout, Cherries And Cherry Juice.
This discussion is now closed. Please join the cherry juice for gout discussion.
For the latest cherries information please see the Cherry Juice For Gout guidelines
A reader made the following comment about cherry juice last year:
I’ll be writing more about ACV (Apple Cider Vinegar) soon.
The message that prompted me to look again at my Cherry Juice Gout page:
What’s your experience with cherries? Any relief or no effect? Please add comments below.
I’ve just received the following message:
I won’t bore you with my full reply, but the part that relates to a possible cherry juice gout cure was:
I understand cherry extracts help reduce uric acid level. Are there any other derivatives from cherries in high enough concentrations to lower uric acid levels. Currently my levels is 0.6 over the upper limit. Can you help?
—
Luv From Arthur Eyetiss
———————–
This post was based on a private message sent to GoutPal, reproduced anonymously.
If you’d like to claim it, first register, then let me know.
Arthur,
From my understanding of the effects of cherries on gout, raw cherries, juice and extracts all have a positive effect in reducing uric acid. Nobody knows why this is so, but the antioxidants in cherries seem to be the favorite option. If this is so, then all dark berries, e.g. bilberries, blackberries and black currants should have a similar effect.
The main problem is to know if these effects are strong enough to reduce uric acid levels sufficiently. Everything I’ve read about antioxidants recently points to positive effects on uric acid, so an antioxidant rich diet should help.
This is the direction I’m taking with my gout diet plan. I’ll be developing this in more detail here soon.
It makes sense to arrange regular uric acid tests to ensure that any action you take to reduce uric acid is working. Remember, if you do this, that uric acid levels change from day to day, and so it is important to look for a downward trend.
—
GoutPal
Some days I think I’m just talking to myself.
Am wondering if pomengrante juice is another juice that can reduce the uric acid effect of gout. health pal
Please see pomegranate juice and gout.
My cases of gout are rare, but extremely severe. Heard about the cherry cure as an ‘old wives tale’. Nothing to lose, so I ate a 16oz can of cherries in water. I went from excruciating pain to normal in 24 hrs.
It works every time for me. I am on this website because yesterday I couldn’t wear a shoe on my right foot – a can of cherries last night, and I am walking today.
I am sold, it works great for me.
To wardlindsey please let me know where can I buy the can of cherries in water.I’m from Montreal Canada,Thank you
I have suffered from gout for the past 10 years .Each year the frequency of attacks and the pain levels increased.I was prescribed napricin to reduce the swelling and relieve the pain.It seemed to do the trick intially, but as time went on it seemed to be less effective. My doctor has recently described alpuranol I am reluctant to take this as I will have to take these tablets for the rest of my life. I read about cherries and cherry juice on the internet about 3 months ago. I had a gout attack 2 weeks ago and decided to try the cherry remedy.What a miracle cure. Within 24 hours of eating the the entire contents of a can of cherries which i bought at Tescos I had instant pain relief and reduced swelling in my joints. After repeating this twice more at 4 day intervals the swelling and pain has disappeared.I would recommend cherries as the drug free form for treating gout
I have seen a study showing that cherries are also uricosuric, causing the kidneys to discharge nire uric acid.
So from the above posts, can I assume that cherries are used mainly to stop an attack in progress? That seems a lot more doable than cherries every day 24/7/365 which can get to be a VERY expensive proposition.
Of course, merely aborting acute attacks does little to stop the inevitable progression of gout which seems to be Diabetes 2, Kidney Failure, perhaps heart disease and DEATH. Aborting acute attacks will not lower the hyperuricemia that is responsible for the awful cascade.
I seem to be worryingly on target for this process Zip! :~(
Only recently have I realised that getting over the attacks every few months and watching alcohol and food type consumption is not enough to stop such a progress (or indeed attacks- though reduced since stopping years of using Bendromethfluthiazide and also retiring from a stressful job).
My SUA was recently just in range for normal [for a non sufferer of gout] (445 umol/dL = 7.5 mg/dL) but other tests now due are more likely to show if problems are developing too far on your ‘cascade’ list!
Frommy experience over the last ten years since discovering cherries as a non-medical palliative for gout… before dicovering them I was on allopurinol which just about kept it under control… since then I’ve not taken allopurinol.
For prevention of attacks I aim for about a handful of cherries or equivalent a day or every other day… they can be any form, fresh (nicest, in season), jam (jelly to those in the US), dried, chocolate coated, ‘pie filling’, canned, cooked in cakes, high fruit content yoghurt, cherry leather, etc etc etc. If I forget for a while I can get an attack, but eating half a pound or so will stop the pain and swelling in its tracks. The effect is almost as fast as NSAID pain killers at stopping the pain, takes about a day for the swelling to go down.
If I remember to each cherries I’m attack free. For periods of over a year… it just gets hard at times to find cherries regularly especially in the march-april and oct-nov periods when fresh cherries are not available.
It’s not expensive… one Marks and Spencer greek yoghurt with cherry compote three times a week for lunch is quite affordable compared to the pain of gout. You can tell, I live in the UK… but there are bound to be alternatives where you live!
Blueberries also seem to work… not tried with strawberries, their season is too short and they are not so nice dried / jammed and such like. Black or dark red cherries seem to be better than white or red ones.
Last time my uric acid was measured it was within normal paramaters… so ongoing cherry consumption appears to act as a fix for the cause not for the symptoms.
My son had a massive gout attack, usually rare in the under 30’s. He was told to eat cherries, but wouldn’t any fruit do? Surely pineapple juice would dissolve
uric acid crystals, as I have read that it can dissolve bone!?
In response to Sylvie from Montreal….
Try Adonis either in Laval or on Cote Vertu. They have Sour Cherry Juice as well as Sour Cherries in light syrup (in a jar)
I’m suffering like hell right now and can’t take NSAID’s (Aleve, Ibuprofen, etc) b/c of high blood pressure so I just came back from buying a supply of both juice and the real cherries.
I’ll try anything to relieve this pain or just cut the damn thing off. (lol)
Welllll, I’ve got to say. Maybe it has different effects on different people but I just drank 2 litres of cherry juice since Monday (we’re Wednesday today) and it didn’t do squat.
If it works for anyone else then….lucky you.
I’m with you on that Robert. Lots of people swear by cherries and concentrated cherry juice, but they do nothing for me either.
Better to follow the advice in my free Gout Pain Relief Guide.
I have been using tart cherries for my gout for the past six months. I learned about them from my doctor. I recently discovered a free tart cherry book that tells how tart cherries can help with gout. It is a good book and best of all it is free. It is called Tart Cherry Health Report. Here is a link if you are interested: [removed pending further investigation]
Has anything changed since this company were warned:
Well, they’re still well in business -and, though no ready reference to Gout, they do sell an arthiritis comforter called Hug so it doesn’t look like they have been knocked off the wall yet!
The move against dietary and supplemental cures is worrying. Big Pharma are ever greedier for profit.
[Or -is there another agenda running?]
I HAVE BEEN DRINKING CHERRYADE AND EATING CHERRIES FOR 18 MONTHS
AND TOUCHWOOD MY GOUT OF 8 YEARS SEEMS TO HAVE GONE
I was hit by a swollen toes three days ago. Couldn’t put weight on my foot. By Friday (after two days) I went to the doctors and he said that he thought it was gout. By later that day I couldn’t even slip on a flip-flop.
This morning I send my wife out to the loca lstore. I’ve had a couple of bowls of cherries and it is certainly working for me.
I’m not sure what brought it on but I’ll make sure that I try to make sure that it doesn’t come back by having a daily glass of cherrie or blackberry juice ………………… oh and a few less beers 🙂
I had my first attack just after my 50th. This is self diagnosed as like many doctors I don’t go near colleagues or have drugs or even plasters in the house. A urate level isn’t diagnostic and who wants a needle in their foot during an acute attack. My chiropractor recommended cherries. They work preventatively and for me as an almost instant cure. I eat fresh cherries, drink juice and use concentrate. The best cure was on an open university astronomy course. I had to stand on tiptoe in the dark on a ladder in an observatory. It was this march in Majorca and gout was unwelcome. I told the organizer, joking about the value of cherries. She produced a jar of german preserved cherries. I ate them all and drank the liquid. Cure in 12 hours. Hope it works for you. Andrew
Ha! Best cure- Astronomy and Cherries…Does it matter which way round they’re taken? 😉
Nice to hear a Dr. admit they’re human, like the rest of us 🙂
I happen to like cherries, but never see the Montmorency ones [in the UK] that are lauded for gout.
Also , drinking loads of sugary juice/water when trying to keep weight down seems a bit anti intuitive esp. if on the edge of pre-diabetes..
Maybe, if I got the ‘right stuff’ during an attack, I would woof the lot too!
From some experiences here . it seems that cherries definitely can help – but not usually in an instant. One case here was already in progress when they were tried and gout can subside more quickly than other times.
I’ve managed to find some decent cherries and blueberries in a local big s/market and will use them every day for as long as I can get them. I can’t seem to find anything other than tinned cherries for pies (same shop) for nearly £2 ($4) and only 30% cherries. Er, No Ta!
If I’m to pay ‘nearly fresh prices’- I need to identify a reliable local quality supplier -or try online with the added costs.
The problem with all these anecdotal stories is that, once someone has’ got a result’ they switch off, (naturally enough) and disappear from the topic.
Without big profits, no one is going to research the true usefulness of all of these reported helpful foods/ products. [See Soda BiCarb- always warned against usage with High BP running]
Ultra Hit and Miss – when some surety is needed abdly.
I have been in agony for 3 days. So, after reading on here about cherries at 11pm I hobbled into the grocery store and headed to the Organic aisle, where I found JUST BLACK CHERRY” Juice, by Knudsen for $3.55 for 32 oz jar. I also found dried cherries in the scoop it yourself aisle…
Will be back to let you know how it works!
I am a new believer in cherries as a tretment for gout. Here is why:
Male 50 years old. Suffering from gout attacks two to four times a year for the past four years. Curiously I had my first attack when I was in my best health. I had dropped about 25 lbs and was excercising and running regularly. I was eating very healthy and was in great shape. The best shape of my life in fact. Then boom… I started to feel pain in my big toe. I thought it was due to all of the running and excercising. I suffered through it for a week or so and then it subsided.
Several months later same thing. I thought perhaps I had broken my toe or something. This time went to the doctor and was diagnosed with gout. Doctor gave me ionformation on diet and foods to avoid etc. and sent me on my way. Thing is… I was not eating the foods that they described as those to avoid. I was eating very healthy.
Got another attack in the same area a few months later. A friend who is a doctor phoned me in a prescription for indomethicine. Took it but it didn’t seem to help much. Suffered through the pain for a week or two again.
This past december I got a sudden attack in my knee that sent me to the emergency room in the middle of the night. Never had an attack in my knee before. The pain was unbearable. ER Doc shot me up with with something and shoved some pills down my throat. He told me I would be a new man in just a few minutes. He knew that I was in excrutiating pain. I have to tell you now that I have a very high tolerance for pain and I am not a wimp. This pain was unbearable. I think either the injection or the pills were morphine or methodone.
MORPHINE! or possibly METHODONE!
Whatever, it worked. I felt better immediately. I was totally out of it and my girlfriend had to drive me home, but I was feeling no pain! (got very sick the next day, but better than the gout pain for sure)
My regular doctor then put me on allopurinol. A good cheap drug that is supposed to assist in keeping uric acid levels low. My uncle swears by it. He suffered from gout for years until he was put on this drug. He hsan’t had an attack in five years.
Anyway I ran out of the first prescription and did not get it refillied. I had plenty of indomethicine, prednisone and oxycodone left over from a few previous attacks.
Last week got an attack in my foot at the base of the big toe.(usually the attack would be on the last joint of the big toe, closest to the tip, this time it was at the base) The pain felt like it was coming from everywhere on my foot. At times I could not tell if it was a broken bone on top of my foot, on the bottom or wherever. Eventually the pain became very obviously emanating from the joint. I knew it was another gout attack. It had been eight months since the last one.
I started taking the prednisone. No effect. Pain kept getting worse each day. I needed the oxycodone to help me sleep. That didn’t seem to work either. Up all night. Finally I started taking the indomethicine, which I had been avoiding because it causes me stomach irritation in the worst way. I was taking two prednisones and two indomethisines twice a day, and an oxycodone before bed. Still no pain relief and no sleep either! I also had been drinking cherry juice the whole time.
Yesterday I dragged myslef to the store and bought two pounds of fresh cherries. Went home and took my meds as usual, but I also ate about twenty cherries at around 8pm. Went to bed with extreme pain. Wrapped my foot in a heating pad and layed there in agony until 11pm. Took the heating pad off, took another oxycodone and finally went to sleep.
AMAZINGLY I WOKE UP WITH ALMOST NO PAIN!
I know that these attacks usually run their course in about a week or so, and this attack may have been about to end, but the overnight pain relief was absolutely amazing to me!
The only thing that I did differently was eat fresh cherries last night.
There is so much confusion about what foods to eat and what to avoid. Some of the info even contradicts each other. Who the hell knows what to believe?
All I know is that when in the midst of an attack you will do anything to relieve the pain.
I believe that the cherries are what did it for me this time. I will see the doctor and get on the allopurinol again, and this time stay on it. But, I will also include fresh cherries in my diet every single day if possible.
I hope this is the last attack that I have.
Sorry, one more thing. The cherry juice that I was drinking was the stuff that you can buy at a regular supermarket like Publix. That stuff does not work. I know that you can buy the real cherry juice from a Whole Foods store or something like that. Don’t waste your time with cherry juice unless it is the real unprocessed kind that you get at Whole Foods.
Better yet just get frsh cherries.
That’s a good story told Larry.
Because there’s no research and we don’t want Pharma owning cherry orchards do we? – there’s a lot to nail down on this.
You have ably illustrated a telling tale of how agonizing pain can be mastered with a God given fruit.
On here is a tale of a company being hounded by Masterful (Dis)State for just helping people.
I have tried raw cherries,(v.nice) blue berries, bottled cherries (Lidl-V. cheap UK) and cherry jam to go with my cherry fruit corners. I have been whacking the wine and beer at a festival [hence my absense GP !]and had no twinges- and that being back on the cursed Thiazides- for BP ( I’ll regret saying all this !).
All I can add right now is nature has an answer that is cheaper,easier and more enjoyable than all the meds in the world.
All that is needed is a standard to work to- as we are all different- and some will need meds in the end- if that is what it takes.
Good to read of your success, anyway.
A big thank you to everyone who has contributed their stories about cherry juice, gout and related stuff.
The page is getting rather long now, and slow to load, so I am going to close the comments.
Please add your gout and cherry (or cherry juice) stories in the gout cure or gout diet forums, as you think fit.
Complete help and reference information for all gout treatment issues is on the main gout website.
Please join the cherry juice for gout discussion.
For the latest cherries information please see the Cherry Juice For Gout guidelines