Testing

Dr. Rodney Ford, pediatrician and author of The Gluten Syndrome, provides us with an excellent and easy-to-follow video that tells us how to know if we need a gluten test.

This short presentation explains which symptoms to look for and tells you the tests you need to to request to find out if gluten is making you sick.

Dr. Ford estimates up to one third of people with chronic diseases are being affected by gluten and sums up why people do not ask to be tested. “We are so used to being sick that we don’t know we’re sick.” People think they have always been this way, so they do not know to ask.

He then establishes a great litmus test to determine who should be tested – “People who are sick, tired or grumpy should be tested.”

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Question: Has anyone just lived GF after only a bloodwork diagnosis? Do you fully trust just the bloodwork?

Quick Answer: Many people live GF after only a bloodwork diagnosis. It is best to get both the bloodwork and endoscopy with biopsy before you go gluten-free. None of the current tests for celiac disease are 100% accurate. If you are not eating gluten, your tests will be negative.  

Long Answer: It is best to get tested before going gluten free. This way, your doctor will take your diagnosis seriously. Also, you will be tested for various deficiencies as a baseline to determine future healing.

The blood tests are not pass/fail, but rather provide a level of antibodies that your immune system is producing. If the level is at a high enough point where a doctor would probably find intestinal damage on endoscopy with biopsy, then you are given a positive result. If the level is not high enough, then your result would be negative. Just because you are negative today, doesn’t mean you will not be positive in the future. This is exactly what happened to a physician assistant I met at a gastroenterology conference. She tested negative. Three months later her results were sky high.

Learn more about Celiac Disease and Gluten Sensitivity Testing and Diagnosis here.

I was recently speaking with a friend at my gym who complained about a number of health problems that sounded like celiac disease. I suggested she get tested.

She answered that she was tested, but it was negative.

I asked when she was tested.

Ten years ago…

Many people report that their doctors tested them and told them, “you don’t have it,” after one blood test.

There is a great deal of confusion when it comes to celiac disease tests. This video answers the question of whether the blood tests are pass/fail.

Finding out you have Celiac Disease is a big transition. Often it’s a good one that leads to feeling great, yet initially it’s a lot of information to take in at once to understand what you need to do for your health. Much of it is because we’re been eating one way for 15, 30, 50 or more years and it can be overwhelming to to instantly unlearn everything we’ve done and change overnight. Wouldn’t life be easier if you could take a doctor or dietitian home as a portable reminder of the basics? And so the Celiac Disease Video Project was born.

See below for videos of Dr. John Snyder, Chief of the Department of Gastroenterology at CNMC in DC, Dr. Gary Kaplan, Medical Director of Kaplan Center for Integrative Medicine and Cheryl Harris, MPH, RD Registered Dietitian and Nutritionist discussing testing, diagnosis and follow-up, eating a gluten-free diet and a short segment on when it’s not Celiac. Though there are an increasing number of videos out there on people’s stories of diagnosis and ways to make a gluten-free pie, this is the first of its kind to do a run-down of the medical and diet basics by healthcare professionals. The Celiac Sprue Association has been kind enough to support the project. Read More »

Photo credit: Celiac Disease Awareness Month

May is National Celiac Disease Awareness Month, so it seems appropriate to share some medical facts about this autoimmune disease that just might shock you.

These facts come from Dr. Tom O’Bryan who is is a nationally recognized speaker and workshop leader specializing in gluten sensitivity and celiac disease.  Dr. O’Bryan’s specialty is in teaching the many manifestations of gluten sensitivity and celiac disease as they occur inside and outside of the Read More »

The options for gluten-free foods are growing for for people with celiac disease, non-celiac gluten sensitivity, and wheat allergy. German scientists, reporting in the American Chemical Society’s Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, have developed a more reliable way for manufacturers to detect gluten in purified wheat starch, a common ingredient in foods labeled gluten-free.¹ Read More »Sources:

1. https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-10/acs-tid101216.php [↩]

This is a Celiac Disease Awareness Month Public Service Announcement.

Many people, including doctors, believe that the blood tests for celiac disease are pass/fail, and that if you have a negative result you can never in the future have a positive result. This is wrong. See how all the celiac disease tests work on our Diagnosis page.

This message was brought to you by our  Gluten Free Extravaganza sponsors, , , and !

In this video, Dr. Osborne discusses the benefits of the gluten-free diet as well as the Paleo diet in an interview with FOX News.

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The following article was written by Erika Gebel and reprinted by permision from Chemical and Engineering News.

Celiac Disease and Gluten Sensitivity Often Go Undiagnosed

Judging by their symptoms, people with celiac disease could have food poisoning, depression, or iron deficiency. As a result, doctors often have trouble diagnosing the serious immune disorder. To develop a better test for the disease, researchers have made a device that can detect nanograms of gluten antibodies, the hallmarks of celiac disease, in human Read More »

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, digestive problems can be really detrimental to your well-being. Whatever your symptoms might be, digestive health is vital to the body’s overall well-being.

Make it your new year goal to figure out the cause of your discomfort and to find a solution that works for you. Read More »