Peanuts are high in purine and should not be eaten by gout patients?

Gout is a complex arthritis associated with uric acid crystal deposition.

Therefore, hyperuricemia is considered a precursor to a gout attack.

Eating foods high in purine compounds is known to increase blood uric acid levels, triggering and exacerbating gout attacks.

Thus, various gout guidelines recommend that diet is an important part of hyperuricemia and gout management.

For example, it is recommended to strictly control foods containing a lot of purines such as chicken liver, meat, etc.

However, there is disagreement about the purine content of other specific foods and whether they are suitable for people with hyperuricemia and gout.

Peanuts are one of them.

There are three different theories about the purine content of peanuts:

Some people say that peanuts have high purine content and are not suitable for patients with hyperuricemia and gout;

Some people say that peanut purine content is moderate, 96.3mg/100g, which is not suitable for patients with gout attack. However, patients with hyperuricemia and gout remission can eat it;

Some people say that peanut purine content is low to medium level, 79mg/100g; in addition, it contains fatty acids with anti-inflammatory properties, not only is not a food that gout patients need to contraindicate, but may benefit gout patients.

In this way, many readers are faced with an ancient problem:

Who are you listening to?

The statement that peanut purine content is 96.3mg/100g is mainly popular in China, and 79mg/100g is spread abroad.

Which statement is more accurate and true?

We might as well look for answers in the published medical literature.

Because, the data circulating in the anecdotes refers to the total purine content of food.

However, we know that total purines include several forms that have different effects on serum uric acid concentrations.

Hypoxanthine, hypoxanthine nucleotides, adenine, adenine nucleotides, and guanine nucleotides can increase blood uric acid concentrations in normouricemia, hyperuricemia, and gout patients.

Among them, hypoxanthine and hypoxanthine nucleotide (metabolized to hypoxanthine) have the most significant effect on blood uric acid; adenine in nucleic acid has a weak effect on increasing blood uric acid.

Interestingly, there have been no reports of guanine altering serum uric acid levels or urinary uric acid excretion, ie guanine in food may not increase blood uric acid levels.

In view of the different effects of different forms of purines on uric acid metabolism, some scientific studies also convert the total purines in food into uric acid equivalents for identification.

So, what kinds of purines do peanuts contain?

In a high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis of purine content in 270 foods, peanuts contained adenine, guanine, hypoxanthine, xanthine, total purine, and uric acid equivalent values ​​of 18.9 and 28.6, respectively. , 0.0, 1.6, 49.1, and 57.1mg/100g.

That is to say, the total purine content of peanuts is less than 50mg/100g, which is a very low purine content food.

Moreover, almost all are guanine and adenine, and mainly guanine which does not have the effect of raising blood uric acid.

Therefore, in theory, peanuts, as a nut (although it belongs to the fruit of legumes), are considered to be a good source of protein and essential fatty acids for gout patients, and gout patients can not only eat, but also recommended food.

Peanut is the recommended food for gout patients. After all, this is only a theoretical presumption. What is the actual effect of eating peanuts on blood uric acid?

An analysis of the effects of 63 diets and genetics on blood uric acid levels published in 2018 found that peanuts were the most significantly lower blood uric acid food after skim milk, eggs, brown bread and cold-brewed cereal.

Of course, other nuts are also recommended foods for hyperuricemia and gout patients, and the purine content is lower than that of peanuts, although the uric acid-lowering effect is not as good as peanuts.