Gout – A Disease Of The Excretory System?

Are you “making” too much uric acid?

Or is it that you just are not getting rid of enough of it fast enough? For most of us, (90%) we are just not getting rid of enough fast enough.

Does that make gout some kind of problem of the excretory system? There’s more to it than you think. The important thing to note is that there are a number of different organs that make up our pathways of elimination and the differentiation between the the digestive/bowel system and the excretory/urinary system is important to be aware of.

“Excretion” in regards to the excretory system can mean several different things, especially if you are trying to figure out what gout really is.  Without getting too deep into this shit (haha!), one system eliminates urine and the other eliminates feces. Since we are talking gout here and how it relates to the excretory system, we know that gout pain is all about uric acid, so we’re going to focus on the components of the excretory organs that make up the urinary system, especially the kidneys.

The Excretory System

I don’t know if you bothered to check out my story or not but I’m just your average bloke on the street with gout and one kidney that solved the mystery. I took it just one step further and decided that I needed to show some love to my fellow man and share what I learned.

Usually I don’t like to go into a real educational post like this but, I got to thinking about it (like I pretty much do every minute of every day) and I really wanted to try to get to the bottom of what causes gout and better yet, what to do about it and send you off with the some good info.

When it comes to gout, most every one thinks, “food”…like gout was some kind of food allergy. It ain’t – food is just one part of it – it really has to do with how your innards have become too acidic and your kidneys just can’t keep up. That’s why we’re talking about all this excretory stuff.

So Here We Go…The Excretory Organs

• Skin
• Lungs
• Kidneys
• Ureter
• Urinary Bladder
• Urethra

We’re going to start with the organs that have less to do with regulating the pH of the body chemistry – those are the skin, ureter, bladder, and urethra.

The skin, while falling under the broad category of  the excretory system, it actually a specific system in and of itself called the Integumentary System. Of all the components of the overall pathways of excretion, the skin plays the smallest role.

It’s main function is a protective covering for the body, and serves to cool the body when it moves toward overheating. In process of sweating or perspiring, some of the excess metabolic wastes like salts and urea – which can be toxic and acidic – are removed.

The ureters are the tubular ducts that connect the kidneys to the bladder and are basically for the transportation of urine. Complications can arise due to the anatomic geography they have to negotiate, and the most common problem is that kidney stones can become lodged in the ureters and cause serious kidney malfunction or failure.

The Bladder collects the urine from the kidneys and acts as a “holding tank” until the complex hormone and nerve response systems call for the bladder to discharge.

The Urethra is the tubular duct that allows the urine held in the bladder to pass to the outside.

Balancing pH

The lungs play an important role in the process of excretion and they are specifically called the respiratory system. The major function of the lungs is respiration, which is the transportation of oxygen as fuel for the cells from outside the body.

Also, the transportation of carbon dioxide out of the body is just as important. Carbon dioxide is an acidic, metabolic waste product in the form of a gas. The action or mechanism of our breathing facilitates this process.

By volume, the process of our breathing and respiration eliminates more acidic waste from our bodies than any other organ. For this reason, learning to breathe fully, completely, and properly is the first order of business to effectively manage and control gout.

Finally, the most important part of the excretory puzzle is the Kidneys. Because of the primary function of the kidneys, they are directly responsible for whether or not you and I end up with gout – and that primary function is to monitor and adjust the blood in three ways:

• Viscosity
• Chemistry
• pH

These three main functions and some others, can only be performed by the kidneys – they are beyond the abilities of the bowel or the skin. The bowel deals with excreting mainly fat-soluble, toxic, solid waste matter, but the kidneys excrete water-soluble wastes.

Keeping the blood clean, the optimal pH, and the proper thickness, is crucial to good health for many different reasons.

When the blood becomes overly toxic, it’s sort of like never changing the oil in your car – it causes excessive wear until one day everything comes to a grinding halt. Billions of hungry microbes thrive on the toxins in the blood and eventually compromise and wear out the immune system.

Drinking water – especially the right water – is of paramount importance to allow the kidneys to do their job of balancing pH and purifying the blood. When you become dehydrated, your blood becomes too thick. When this happens a wide range of illness and disease can take root because the circulation of oxygen, minerals, nutrients, and hormones will not be transported and transferred effectively to the tissues and cells throughout the entire body.

If problems occur that decrease the ability of the kidneys to work properly or do their job in any way, the blood pressure gets thrown out of whack, ammonia, and a long list of other toxic, acidic, metabolic wastes and by-products can build up. Mental problems can arise, swelling and inflammation of body tissues occurs, as well as impaired function of other organs.

. . .

Hi Bert,

Sorry that our Guru had to go through running to a store to get your Magic Potion to hold off the enemy. But you knew just what to do. Since I’m retired I don’t do a lot of traveling, so when I’ve had a problem it has been at home. Since I’ve followed your advice and lost weight and modified my diet, it has been over a year since I’ve had an attrack! With your advice I will even have some lobster tail when our son comes to visit from LA.

Best regards,
Ted

. . .

What Else?

A quick recap of what the kidneys do for you and me:

• control the concentrations of fluids in the body
• get rid of soluble waste
• regulate the acid/alkaline balance of the body and blood

Something else to note is that the cells of the body sort of float in the Interstitial Fluid. This fluid is a careful balance of salt and potassium and if it’s off, the cells can absorb too much water or…not enough. The kidneys make this balance of salt and potassium happen.

A few other things to know about how your kidneys serve you is that they help to control blood pressure, excessive blood glucose, minerals, various metabolic wastes, as well as gout-causing urea from the breakdown of proteins.

Finishing Up

So you see, when you get gout, it’s because your kidneys and the rest of your excretory systems are overloaded – you’re pushing them to hard. It can be because of all the crap you’ve been eating, OR all the benders you seem to have to participate in every other night.

But really, if you just consistently drank the right daily amount of good water, learned to breathe like a champion, and started eating clean food ALL the time, you wouldn’t have gout…because your kidneys wouldn’t be working so hard.

   ☆ Bottom-line:  Show your kidneys some seriously BIG FAT LOVE.