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This is my response. I plan to submit - so if you have editing
suggestions let me know. Will follow with summaries.
As someone with celiac disease who has spent the last five years
trying to educate the general public about the need for gluten-free
foods, the title of an article in Sunday’s health and fitness section
caught my eye. It read, "Going Gluten-Free: Even those with no medical
need are modifying their diets. But is it healthy?" The article reads
"We see some self diagnosers who have read about celiac disease on the
Internet or heard about it from a friend and have made a kind-of
self-diagnosis. This can cause unnecessary worry, dietary
restrictions, and expense." In the last paragraph "gluten-free" is
referred to as a quirky health kick. "If you just google the silly
thing, there's all sorts of dieticians and medical professionals
against it. They're just not organized yet to [band together and] say,
'You know what? This is ridiculous.'”
If I eat at a restaurant and my meal is not “gluten-free” I get a
whopping migraine and severe intestinal cramps within 20 minutes. I
won’t tell you what the rest of the night is like, and hopefully it
won’t involve an IV in the ER. Reactions range in severity and others
who have celiac disease react differently, just as two people with
multiple sclerosis will show very different symptoms. The article
targets folks who go on the gluten-free diet for no apparent reason.
This affects me, and my ability to eat safely outside of my home.
Think about my dilemma. Usually my server will have no idea what
gluten is, so I have to explain that I cannot eat wheat, rye, or
barley, and that these are in a lot of sauces and flavoring agents.
The routine gets old, but every time I must explain that I’ll get
very, very sick if my food is contaminated with these ingredients.
This time is different, however. I no sooner say, “I need my food to
be gluten-free,” and he replies, okay, yeah, I’ve heard of that – I
just read an article in the paper about it. At this point I want to
welcome the opportunity to sit back and retire the old song and dance.
But no. Now I must work even harder to convey to the chef that I will
get very ill if I eat any gluten, because I have to dispel this myth
that is growing among the general public that I am part of some
“quirky” group of hypochondriacs, or that I am taking a ride on the
gluten-free bandwagon.
American doctors have managed to diagnose 3% of people with celiac
disease. It is 97% undiagnosed. Where are all of those celiacs? One
out of every 133 people has celiac disease, but at least one out of
every 20 people has an adverse reaction to wheat and related grains.
Are these people “self-diagnosers?” just because they have learned
that going gluten-free has improved their health? Put together an
educated doctor who has the wrong story and a journalist looking to
blow a big “fad” out of the water – and you get a population of
ignorant nose-thumbers. I already know too many people who raise a
brow when I say that I have celiac disease. It is hereditary, so we
have had several family members tested. My son’s specialist asked me,
“but are you biopsy diagnosed?” Translation, “did you qualify as one
of three percent of celiacs in the country?” My father’s doctor said,
“you don’t need a test for celiac disease – you are 60 years old. If
you had it you would know, and you’ll never follow that diet anyway.”
An article that cries, “the gluten-free diet may not be healthy” adds
fuel to this fire.
Celiac disease may be triggered at any age, and it is twice as common
as Crohn’s, ulcerative colitis and cystic fibrosis combined.
Untreated, it can lead to infertility/multiple miscarriages, premature
births, reduced bone density, neurological disorders, malignancies,
thyroid disease, diabetes, and/or autoimmune liver disease. Once the
gluten-free diet has been established patients may feel better within
days. If too much damage has been done, a full recovery may not be
possible. A gluten-free diet will interfere with the ability to make
an accurate diagnosis, so the author sends one good message – do not
start the diet until after you have been tested for celiac disease.
Make no mistake, the gluten-free diet is healthy. Look at a typical
list of gluten-containing items: cookies, cake, pastries, cereal, soy
sauce, emulsifiers, thickeners, pasta and beer. You cannot tell me
that cutting these things out of my diet is going to make me
unhealthy. One might argue that when you merely find a gluten-free
replacement for all of the items listed above, and call that your
“gluten-free diet”, vitamin deficiencies are inevitable. More often
than not, however, people who abide by a gluten-free diet find
themselves in health food stores shopping for organic and whole foods.
I eat more fruits and vegetables now than I ever have. This is because
the only treatment for celiac disease is a strict, lifelong
gluten-free diet.
This author is barking up the wrong tree. If she really aims to better
the health of her readers she should try this approach: The American
diet. Even those who are obese and malnourished stay on it. But is it
healthy?
Here is a message worth banding together about: There are several
routine tests for celiac disease, yet it takes an average of 11 years
for a symptomatic patient to be diagnosed. That, my friends, is
ridiculous.
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