Uric acid biorhythm, a feature of long-term variation in a clinical laboratory database.

BACKGROUND:The biorhythm of serum uric acid was evaluated in a large sample of a clinical laboratory database by spectral analysis and the influence of the gender and age on uric acid variability. METHODS:Serum uric acid values were extracted from a large database of a clinical laboratory from May 2000 to August 2006. Outlier values were excluded from the analysis and the remaining data (n=73,925) were grouped by gender and age ranges. Rhythm components were obtained by the Lomb Scargle method and Cosinor analysis. RESULTS:Serum uric acid was higher in men than in women older than 13 years (p<0.05). Compared with 0-12 year group, uric acid increased in men but not in women older than 13 years (p<0.05). Circannual (12 months) and transyear (17 months) rhythm components were detected, but they were significant only in adult individuals (>26 years, p<0.05). Cosinor analysis showed that midline estimating statistic of rhythm (MESOR) values were higher in men (range: 353-368 μmol/L) than in women (range: 240-278 μmol/L; p<0.05), independent of the age and rhythm component. The extent of predictable change within a cycle, approximated by the double amplitude, represented up to 20% of the corresponding MESOR. CONCLUSIONS:Serum uric acid biorhythm is dependent on gender and age and it may have relevant influence on preanalytical variability of clinical laboratory results.