As many people know, gout attacks are unbearable and it is a time to consciously go to the hospital and seek medication to relieve the pain. But after the pain is controlled, is it possible to “rest easy”? In fact, gout is a disease caused by the disorder of purine metabolism in the body, resulting in an increase in uric acid production and/or a decrease in uric acid excretion, and a long-term accumulation of uric acid salts in the joints and kidneys, resulting in the formation of gout stones or kidney stones, causing damage to joints and kidneys and other organs. Uric acid buildup does not occur overnight, which means that it cannot be treated once and for all. Once a gout attack occurs, it means that a lot of uric acid crystals have been deposited in the joint cavity, and long-term uric acid-lowering treatment is needed to slowly remove the “iceberg”; if uric acid-lowering treatment is not regular, it will lead to frequent gout attacks. Therefore, the treatment of gout is divided into two stages: after the acute attack period, the symptoms are relieved by anti-inflammation and pain relief, and the intermittent period (pain relief period) still requires follow-up uric acid-lowering treatment. Only by controlling uric acid below the normal range (360μmol/L) can we avoid recurrent attacks of gout and prevent further damage to joints and kidneys. At present, the commonly used clinical uric acid-lowering drugs include allopurinol, benzbromarone, febuxostat, etc. These drugs achieve the purpose of lowering uric acid by inhibiting uric acid production or promoting uric acid excretion, but they are all metabolized by liver and kidney, and kidney stones formed by high uric acid and uric acid salts will also affect kidney function. Therefore, regular checkups of uric acid and liver and kidney functions will help your doctor understand your current uric acid level and liver and kidney functions, and whether the current treatment drugs are effective for you and whether they are damaging your liver and kidney functions. For example, if you are currently using allopurinol to lower your uric acid and your liver function is found to be abnormal after a review, your doctor will change your uric acid-lowering medication such as benzbromarone or febuxostat, or add liver protection medication if necessary to ensure the safety of your treatment; if you do not have a review and continue to take this medication blindly, you will be too late to regret when serious liver function damage occurs, which is detrimental to your health, and you will have to spend more money The cost of treating your liver is much greater than regular review. Therefore, regular review can help the doctor to judge the patient’s physical status, the efficacy of the drugs and whether there are side effects on the patient’s body, and adjust the drugs at the right time to ensure safe and effective treatment. It is generally recommended that patients who take uric acid-lowering drugs initially should have their uric acid and liver and kidney functions reviewed in outpatient clinic after 2 weeks; if the results are not abnormal, they can be reviewed once a month; if the results are not abnormal, they can be reviewed once every 2-3 months. It is recommended to review uric acid and liver and kidney function at least once in 3 months. For patients with kidney stones, it is recommended to review the kidney ultrasound in 3-6 months to observe the changes of stones, whether there is an increase or enlargement, and to deal with them in time. Kidney ultrasound is more convenient, but you need to make an appointment, and it is better to make an appointment in advance. It is also better to fix one hospital for follow-up, because one of the reasons is that the doctor knows your condition better and it is convenient to follow up your condition regularly; the other reason is that different hospitals may have different testing instruments and methods and different reference values, which makes it difficult for the doctor to judge the rise and fall of uric acid level. The day before the follow-up examination, you should avoid eating too much meat, seafood and other high purine foods, and avoid drinking alcohol; appropriate water consumption will not affect the test results much, so you do not need to control your diet and water intake. On the day of follow-up examination, blood should be drawn on an empty stomach, so it is recommended that patients should not come for examination until they have eaten breakfast on the day of the review. We hope that gout patients can have regular treatment and regular review to ensure safe and effective treatment, thus reducing the frequency of gout attacks and saying goodbye to gout.