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Glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1 RAs) and glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide receptor agonists (GIP RAs) are incretin mimetics that have increased in use in the management of type 2 diabetes and obesity. Understanding the po...

Gout is the most prevalent inflammatory arthritis in North America, affecting approximately 3.8% of the population in Canada and 5.1% in the United States (US). Epidemiological modeling through 2050 projects that high-income North America will sustai...

Background and Objectives: The nomenclature of calcium pyrophosphate deposition (CPPD) disease remains confusing, with different labels used interchangeably to describe the disease. Although ‘CPPD disease’ is the term that has been recomm...

Humans and other great apes are unique among animals in lacking functional uricase, an enzyme that breaks down urate and allows its excretion. Modern-day humans have elevated serum urate, which is associated with various chronic health issues, includ...

Gout is one of the most common inflammatory arthritides worldwide, and its burden is rising in Southeast Asia alongside rapid demographic and socioeconomic transitions. This region, characterized by diverse healthcare systems, cultural practices, and...

Gout is a systemic metabolic inflammatory disease driven by hyperuricemia and monosodium urate crystal deposition, and is frequently accompanied by chronic kidney disease and uric acid nephrolithiasis. Current evidence indicates that acidic urine, hy...

Background and Objectives: Despite evidence demonstrating the advantages of rheumatology-led point-of-care (POC) polarised light microscopy (PLM), it remains underutilised in many hospital settings. We aimed to identify barriers to its use and assess...

Calcific tendinitis (CT) is a condition that most commonly affects the rotator cuff tendons of the shoulder joint. Fundamental crystal morphology and composition underlying different radiological stages of CT remained insufficiently characterized. We...

Basic calcium phosphate (BCP) and calcium pyrophosphate dihydrate (CPPD) crystals drive the degenerative and inflammatory pathways that lead to crystal arthropathy. Although recent classification criteria and imaging recommendations have improved sta...

The crystal arthropathies gout and calcium pyrophosphate deposition (CPPD) disease represent a significant subset of rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases, yet their overlap with common entities such as osteoarthritis (OA), rheumatoid arthritis (RA)...

Prior research suggests a connection between osteoarthritis and gout at sites commonly affected by gouty attacks. Whether this connection exists at sites with known monosodium urate crystal deposition but less commonly affected by gouty attacks, such...

Hyperuricemia influences several aspects of the immune system. It enhances cytokine production by monocytes and activates neutrophils and natural killer cells. Within the adaptive immune system, hyperuricemia enhances antigen presentation, skews T he...

Gout is the most common form of inflammatory arthritis in men, driven by hyperuricemia and the deposition of monosodium urate (MSU) crystals. The innate immune response to these crystals leads to acute inflammatory episodes, called flares, characteri...

‘Irregular gout’ is an obsolete term that was used in the past to describe both trivial and serious health issues seemingly related to gouty arthritis. This article looks back at what physicians such as George Cheyne, William Oliver, Will...

The 1st Joint Ectopic Calcification Meeting (JECM) was held in Nancy, France on 24–26 September 2025. In response to the growing need for unified scientific dialogue on soft tissue ectopic calcification, the Joint Ectopic Calcification Meeting...

Allopurinol, the most used urate-lowering drug for the treatment of gout, is associated with rare but life-threatening severe cutaneous adverse reactions (SCARs) such as Stevens–Johnson Syndrome (SJS), Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis (TEN), and Drug...

When, as a junior doctor, Dorian Haskard made a presentation on a patient with gout to the Medical Staff Round at the London Hospital in 1981, he was told that gout was ‘yesterday’s disease and academically dead’ [...]

The eleventh annual international G–CAN research symposium was held in Chicago, IL, on the 22nd and 23rd of October 2025. This hybrid meeting, a live face-to-face and virtual live symposium, was attended by 198 participants. Twenty-five researc...

The diagnosis of crystal-induced arthritis is routinely established by synovial fluid analysis. However, a synovial effusion is not always present, fluid aspiration is not always possible or practical, and synovial fluid analysis is occasionally subj...

For the 16th Anniversary this year, the ECN workshop is again held in downtown Paris. Every year the ECN workshop offers a unique opportunity for clinicians and researchers interested in crystals, inflammation, and crystal-induced diseases, including...

Calcium pyrophosphate deposition (CPPD) disease is a consequence of the immune response to the pathological accumulation of calcium pyrophosphate (CPP) crystals within joints. This clinically heterogeneous condition can cause significant disability,...

Objective: Monosodium urate (MSU) crystallization in human joints is poorly understood. This study aimed to investigate whether the length of MSU crystals varies in relation to organized ultrasound deposits, which may lead to longer crystals. Methods...

We conducted a two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) study including only European men to test for a causal relationship between serum urate (SU), gout, and prostate cancer. Using genome-wide association (GWAS) data, we generated instrumental varia...

Gout is the most common inflammatory arthritis. Treatment of gout includes anti-inflammatory and urate-lowering agents. Robust guidelines by the American College of Rheumatology, the European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology and other commit...

Patients suffering from erosive tophaceous gout who have failed oral urate-lowering therapies and pegloticase have few therapeutic options. Pegloticase failure (infusion reaction or lack of urate lowering) is primarily due to the development of anti-...

Gout and calcium pyrophosphate crystal deposition disease (CPPD) are frequently associated with comorbid disorders, including coronary artery disease and osteoarthritis, in which ectopic calcification with basic calcium phosphate crystals commonly af...

Gout is a chronic inflammatory disease characterized by the deposition of monosodium urate (MSU) crystals within joints, leading to recurrent acute flares and long-term tissue damage. While various hypotheses have been proposed to explain the self-li...

This review provides an overview of the most significant developments in gout pathophysiology research published in 2024. Thirteen studies were selected based on originality, scientific rigor, and potential clinical impact and grouped into four major...

The 3rd Annual Meeting of the International Network on Ectopic Calcification (INTEC) was held in Faro, Portugal on 12–13 September 2024. This hybrid meeting brought together researchers and clinicians focused on the molecular, (patho)physiologi...

The evidence regarding allopurinol’s effects on renal function among people with hyperuricemia and gout has been conflicting, though clinicians are often cautious about using allopurinol in chronic kidney disease (CKD). We sought to examine the...

Objectives: Identification of monosodium urate (MSU) and calcium pyrophosphate (CPP) crystals in synovial fluid should ideally be performed within 24 h to ensure optimal diagnostic accuracy for gout and CPP arthritis. However, crystal identification...

Objectives: (1) To compare cytokine levels in participants with serum urate (SU) < 360 µmol/L, SU ≥ 360 µmol/L with and without monosodium urate (MSU) crystal deposition, respectively, and inter-critical gout. (2) To explore the ass...

The tenth annual international G-CAN research symposium was held in Alexandria, VA on the 13th and 14th of November 2024. This hybrid meeting, a live face-to-face and virtual live symposium, was attended by 201 participants. Over 20 research abstract...

Xanthine oxidoreductase (XOR) is the only enzyme responsible for uric acid production and is essential for preventing gout. While XOR inhibitors effectively reduce serum urate levels, they also influence purine salvage and de novo pathways, as well a...

Background: Mendelian randomization (MR) is a genetic epidemiological method used to infer causal relationships between exposures and outcomes. Its application in hyperuricemia and gout has grown exponentially owing to the ready availability of summa...

Monosodium urate, calcium pyrophosphate, and basic calcium phosphate crystals are the most common types of crystals found in the joints. Each type of crystal has been associated with the onset of different joint diseases. However, the mechanisms iden...

Genetic association studies in gout have identified genetic variants in or near genes involved in the biosynthesis and transport of urate and in immunological pathways. However, the causal role of the remaining genetic variants, genes, and pathways i...

Calcium pyrophosphate deposition disease (CPPD) has been shown to be associated with inflammatory arthritis such as rheumatoid arthritis. However, few studies have investigated the correlation between CPPD and psoriatic arthritis (PsA). Our study aim...

This review examines the concept of “psout”, an overlap syndrome of hyperuricemic psoriatic arthritis (HU-PsA) and co-existing gout and PsA. The manuscript explores its epidemiology, pathophysiology, clinical implications, and treatment s...

Gout management strategies remain a topic of debate, particularly regarding the efficacy of treat-to-target (T2T) and treat-to-avoid-symptoms (T2S) approaches. T2T, endorsed by major rheumatology societies, involves systematic serum urate (sUA) monit...

Lifelong urate-lowering therapy (ULT) is recommended for gout to prevent flares and urate deposition. However, concerns about its adherence, long-term side effects, and the necessity of continuous treatment after achieving remission raise critical qu...

Gout is a common inflammatory joint disease in China. In recent years, the prevalence of gout in China has been increasing and the onset age of gout has been trending younger. The common risk factors for gout in China include hyperuricemia, age, sex,...

Gout is the most common inflammatory arthritis, with a growing global disease burden. This conference report summarizes nine impactful publications dating from 11/2022 to 10/2023 to inform and improve clinical care in gout. The articles we present he...

We assessed changes in vascular inflammation and monosodium urate (MSU)-coded deposits after administration of Pegloticase in the vasculature of tophaceous gout patients using ¹⁸F-fluorodeoxyglucose (¹⁸F-FDG) Positron emission tomography/computed tom...

Gout is a crystal-induced arthropathy in which monosodium urate (MSU) crystals precipitate within joints as a result of persistent hyperuricemia and elicit an inflammatory response. An intriguing aspect is the occurrence of gout in only 10–15% of hyp...

Background: The gold standard for crystal arthritis diagnosis relies on the identification of either monosodium urate (MSU) or calcium pyrophosphate (CPP) crystals in synovial fluid. With the goal of enhanced crystal detection, we adapted a standard...

15th Anniversary this year: the ECN workshop is set up in Paris, down town. Every year ECN workshop offers a unique opportunity for clinicians and researchers interested in crystals, inflammation, crystal-induced diseases including gout, to present t...

Periarticular calcifications are a common condition for rheumatologists. They are characterized by deposition of carbonated apatite in tendons or connective tissues around joints. It most commonly affects patients between 30 and 60, and the main loca...

Many preclinical reports have coalesced to identify a strong association between obesity and increased levels of uric acid (UA) in tissues and, importantly, in the circulation (hyperuricemia). Unfortunately, nearly all these studies were conducted wi...

Calcification refers to the deposition of calcium-containing crystals either intracellularly or within the extracellular matrix. Physiologic calcification is a normal process occurring during bone and tooth development and growth. In contrast, pathol...