Celiac Disease

The definition of Celiac disease is a common inflammatory disease of the small bowel that is precipitated by the consumption of foods that contain gluten. But Celiac disease is an autoimmune disease that the small intestine is hypersensitive to gluten, which leads to the difficulty of digesting food. This condition damages the lining of the small intestine and prevents it from absorbing nutrients from parts of food that are important for being healthy. The damage is due to a reaction to eating gluten, which is found in wheat, barley, and rye.

The reason I chose this topic is because my younger brother was diagnosed with this disease in 2002, and I find it very interesting and how it is well known now compared to 12 years ago when it was rare and there were hardly resources and the amount of people diagnosed and to find gluten free food and restaurant they are able to prepare gluten free foods. The whole concept of this paper is to understand what celiac disease is about and what are the new scientific studies that have come along currently.

Celiac disease is said to affect about 1% of the population, and has been found not only in Europe and countries populated by Europeans, but also in North Africa the Middle East and India. Celiac disease can start for anyone at any age, it is diagnosed equally between adults and children, but it’s more regularly diagnosed in primary age than in preschool children. The current state in diagnosing celiac disease is by performing an Esophagogastroduodenoscopy with duodenal biopsy. Patients that are considered to have celiac disease if the presence of at least one of these symptoms occurs, abdominal pain, chronic diarrhea, unexplained anemia, osteoporosis, unexplained neuropathy, and/or u...

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...stroenterol. (2) 5: 303-309.

David H Dewar, Suzanne C Donnelly, and Paul J Ciclitir. P 2012. Celiac disease: Management of persistent symptoms in patients on a gluten-free diet World J Gastroenterol. 18 (12): 1348-1356.

Alessio Fasano, MD; Irene Berti, MD; Tania Gerarduzzi, MD; Tarcisio Not, MD; Richard B. Colletti, MD; Sandro Drago, MS; Yoram Elitsur, MD; Peter H. R. Green, MD; Stefano Guandalini, MD; Ivor D. Hill, MD; Michelle Pietzak, MD; Alessandro Ventura, MD; Mary Thorpe, MS; Debbie Kryszak, BS; Fabiola Fornaroli, MD; Steven S. Wasserman, PhD; Joseph A. Murray, MD; Karoly Horvath, MD, PhDP 2003 Prevalence of Celiac Disease in At-Risk and Not-At-Risk Groups in the United States Arch Intern Med. 2003;163(3):286-292

"Elafin Protein Discovery May Mean Treatment For Celiac Disease." Elafin Protein Discovery May Mean Treatment For Celiac Disease. N.p., n.d.