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. 2017 Jul;36(7):1595-1598.
doi: 10.1007/s10067-017-3591-z. Epub 2017 Mar 10.

Seasonal variations of urate in a Swedish adult population

Axel Åkerblom  1   2 , Johanna Helmersson-Karlqvist  3 , Tomas Weitoft  4 , Anders Larsson  5
Affiliations

Seasonal variations of urate in a Swedish adult population

Axel Åkerblom et al. Clin Rheumatol. 2017 Jul.

Abstract

Seasonality in the incidence and prevalence of gout has previously been reported but the cause of this seasonality in gout is not explained. The aim of this study was to evaluate possible seasonal variations of urate in a large unselected Swedish adult population. We analyzed 170,915 urate test results from patients at a tertiary care hospital between 2000 and 2016. The results were divided according to sex and sampling month of the year. The median urate values were overall higher in males compared to females and both males and females had peak urate concentrations in the summer months (June-August). There is a seasonal pattern for urate concentrations in a large Swedish population similar to the previously reported seasonality for gout. This may be clinically important and could contribute to the circannual variation of gout. The seasonal pattern should be recognized when evaluating patient results both in clinical practice and in research studies.

Keywords: Biological markers; Circannual variation; Gout; Humans; Urate; Uric acid.

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Conflict of interest statement

Disclosures

None.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Median and interquartile ranges for urate values in μmol/L for males divided according to month (P < 0.0001)
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Median and interquartile urate values in μmol/L for females divided according to month (P < 0.0001)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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