Background Heritage Question

[CMCM 13]

After reading all my celiac realted books, they keep stressing that celiac disease has a higher prevalence in people with Northern European/Irish/Italian heritage. I'm curious about that....what are your backgrounds on both parents' sides?

I'll start....for me, Swedish on my Dad's side, and on my mom's side Germanic/Russian/English. So I definitely fit that profile.

How about the rest of you?

[Bonnie 0]

I was born in Scotland and my heritage is all Scottish!!

Yvonne

[taweavmo3 1]

Part Irish from my mother's side, and Greek from my father's side. I'm not sure where the celiac genes came from.....my mom's entire family has intestinal issues, but my father's family on the maternal side all had stunted growth and late maturity. His mother was only 4'10. So maybe both, who knows. I would love to have them all gene tested, but I don't think I can get everyone to cooperate! All of my kids (only one actually tested +) have gluten reactions and are now gluten free. My brother, me and I believe my late sister (if she was still here to be tested, she was bipolar, and only 4'9 at maturity) have celiac as well. Only my other older sister seems symptom free. So it's very pervasive in my family, which I think is really interesting.

[RoseNNJ 0]

100 percent Italian

[hungryforlife 0]

My Mom's Side

GM (Scotch-Irish) Grandfather:(English- ancestor was John Wesley)

Dad's side:

Don't know? His last name was Ellis so I assume English.

[jerseyangel 413]

Italian--both sides

[penguin 5]

sweedamickacanuckaho

Sweedish (dad)

Irish (mom)

French-Canadian (dad)

Native American (mom)

Blindingly pale, easily burned, redhead personality

Do I fit the profile, or what

[Rachel--24 7]

Moms side....Italian/Spanish

Dad's side....Mexican (I dont know if there's anything mixed in with that)

It had to come from my mom.

[mrsnj91 0]

Wow this is interesting!

We are having my DD tested for this so I will give you HER parents background .....

Me-Irish, Spanish and American Indian

Daddy's-English and Polish

Just from the few responses....your books seem right! I will have to show my husband this as we were just talking about this over the weekend!

Added: I was looking over the responses again and noticed that some said only one side that fit that discripition. I heard a ped. GI speak this weekend and she said that BOTH parents have to carry the gene. Not necessarily have Celiac but carry the gene(s). Interesting how some on here have one parent that doesn't fit the 'mold'. Just some food for thought! I just found this post interesting.

[CMCM 13]

Since the theory is that those areas most recently exposed to gluten/wheat would have the HIGHEST rates of celiac disease, and those areas which have eaten gluten the longest have the lowest rates (because natural selection over several thousand years has been eliminating the celiacs!!!), I would expect the very highest rates to be in Native Americans!!! There was a woman here back in January who was Native American, but I haven't seen her around for awhile. I wonder how many others are celiac and don't know it?

Another interesting thing....the original cultivated wheat did not have nearly as much gluten as the wheat does today. Because of the desirable qualities of wheat in cooking (lightness and puffiness in baking), wheat has actually been developed to have a much higher gluten content that the original wheat did, so I guess people are more affected now.

Anyhow, this is all intereting....

[francelajoie 0]

Both parents are French Canadians

[mrsnj91 0]

The GI said that North Europian decent where at higher risk. But if you go by your theory with the American Indian then I gave a double whammy there! LOL! My guess is that American Indians had more of a corn intake as their base for grain?

Interesting on the grains evolving. I can see that.

[Ursa Major 5]

100% German

[DingoGirl 12]

One-quarter Norwegian and the rest, Scottish, Irish, English.

I think there was another thread juts like this running the last few days, also inspired by that book (I'm waiting for my copy!). Seemed to me that it had gotten to be several pages....check it out!

[Rachel--24 7]

Added: I was looking over the responses again and noticed that some said only one side that fit that discripition. I heard a ped. GI speak this weekend and she said that BOTH parents have to carry the gene. Not necessarily have Celiac but carry the gene(s). Interesting how some on here have one parent that doesn't fit the 'mold'. Just some food for thought! I just found this post interesting.

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong but as far as I know both parents do not need to have a celiac gene in order for the child to aquire a gene. You only need one Celiac gene to develop the disease and you can get that from either parent.

[CMCM 13]

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong but as far as I know both parents do not need to have a celiac gene in order for the child to aquire a gene. You only need one Celiac gene to develop the disease and you can get that from either parent.

I asked that of Dr. Fine when I got my test results, and he confirmed that you only actually need one celiac gene to have a predisposition. You get one gene from each parent, so you could get one celiac gene, plus a second gene from the other parent that was some non-gluten related gene, so you either could get celiac or you might not, 50% chance I guess.

[gfmelissa 0]

My parents are portuguese and the other is english/german.

I am wondering more about that GI you heard speak that said both parents have to be carriers of the gene? did they mention what the theory is on that? If not thats cool, just wondering.

[danikali 0]

I don't fit the profile. I'm mostly Polish and a little bit German. Unless somewhere down the line there is something else that I don't know about. But how could you not know?

[CMCM 13]

My parents are portuguese and the other is english/german.

I am wondering more about that GI you heard speak that said both parents have to be carriers of the gene? did they mention what the theory is on that? If not thats cool, just wondering.

No no no....I specifically asked Dr. Fine about this once...both parents do not have to give you a gene. You need only ONE gene to have problems. If you have TWO genes (one from each parent) your likelihood of having problems is far greater, however. And there are some people with no identified genes that have celiac disease, so there are obviously some genes that are related to this which have not yet been identified. I think it's about 1% with that scenario.

[Smunkeemom 0]

wow. it's difficult to answer. It's my girls who have celiac, and other people in my family. My mother is Irish/Scotish, and that's the side the celiac is on, so I suppose that's the answer.

[luvs2eat 60]

Both parents are Scottish/Irish.

[Angelina 0]

After reading all my celiac realted books, they keep stressing that celiac disease has a higher prevalence in people with Northern European/Irish/Italian heritage. I'm curious about that....what are your backgrounds on both parents' sides?

I'll start....for me, Swedish on my Dad's side, and on my mom's side Germanic/Russian/English. So I definitely fit that profile.

How about the rest of you?

1/2 Irish from my father (who i dont know)

Scottish, Native American.. Mother side

I know who I got my genes from! grrr

[nikki-uk 28]

No no no....I specifically asked Dr. Fine about this once...both parents do not have to give you a gene. You need only ONE gene to have problems. If you have TWO genes (one from each parent) your likelihood of having problems is far greater, however. And there are some people with no identified genes that have celiac disease, so there are obviously some genes that are related to this which have not yet been identified. I think it's about 1% with that scenario.

I was trying to explain this to my 16 yr old son (who has symptoms and we want to get tested)

He wanted to know the chances of him having celiac disease.(His Dad has biopsy proven celiac disease-no gene test though)

I (tried) to explain to him that assuming his Dad has one of the two HLA markers that predispose you to celiac disease,he may have passed that gene onto him(but not necessarily so).

And even if he has passed the gene onto him,there has to be a 'trigger' for celiac disease to occur(illness, huge stress etc.)

And of course I (his Mum) may carry the gene too,(I don't have celiac disease).

In which case he would have 2 genes for celiac disease,or 1 or none.

Did everyone follow that?

[CMCM 13]

I was trying to explain this to my 16 yr old son (who has symptoms and we want to get tested)

He wanted to know the chances of him having celiac disease.(His Dad has biopsy proven celiac disease-no gene test though)

I (tried) to explain to him that assuming his Dad has one of the two HLA markers that predispose you to celiac disease,he may have passed that gene onto him(but not necessarily so).

And even if he has passed the gene onto him,there has to be a 'trigger' for celiac disease to occur(illness, huge stress etc.)

And of course I (his Mum) may carry the gene too,(I don't have celiac disease).

In which case he would have 2 genes for celiac disease,or 1 or none.

Did everyone follow that?

It makes perfect sense to me. Awareness is the key....but knowing the genes from both parents is great because then you really have a firmer idea. Obviously if you have been diagnosed celiac you have at least ONE gene, but if like me, you find out you have TWO genes, then you know for sure your kids have at least one problem gene. For me, the wild card is my husband....being Irish & Norwegian he just might have one, but we don't know. I guess getting one celiac/gluten gene from each parent might mean your likelihood of eventual problems is greater than with just one. Since I have two, I therefore know my two kids have one or the other of my genes, therefore they have the predisposition at the very least and should be watching for it throughout their lives. Lacking any sort of real symptoms now, they certainly don't want to change their diets or even think about it much, but down the road if something triggers symptoms, at least they know where to start looking.....whereas I was kind of oblivious to the idea for most of my life!

[Guest mvaught]

Irish

French

Native American

German

Welch

luck of the Irish?