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N>Treatment: He said that the treatment is the gluten-free diet for life and
N>taking the sulfa drug dapsone for a short time to control the itching
N>while it lasts. (He didn't specify how you know the when itching has
N>stopped if the dapsone is controlling it.) However, the dapsone has
N>serious side effects and someone taking it must have regular blood tests
N>to monitor them.
 
I suffered all the miseries of undiagnosed CD and the concomitant
annoyance of DH for 13 years before a competent dermatologist rescued
me. The Dapsone was terrifying. It also worked well (in conjunction with
the DIET.) The DAPSONE threw me into an anemic condition so  severe, that
my gastroenterologist thought I had some form of leukemia. The anemia
reversed itself in six weeks and I got off the couch!(Never could write
poetry anyway) I've often wondered if Elizabeth Barret Browning and
Emily Dickinson were undiagnosed Celiacs.
 
My arms are scarred, but, at least they are not full of weeping,
bleeding blebs.Yuk! For the 13 years prior to Dapsone, myriad doctors
had dismissed my dermatitis as "black fly bites", although, I could
never recall being bitten. Black flies were indigenous  to the area i
lived in at that time. AMS