Chilblains, Raynaud's Syndrome, Cold Hands & Feet

[Russ H]

I have always suffered from cold hands and feet and had a mild Raynaud's type condition where my fingers would go white and numb. About 10 years ago, I began to get chilblains in winter. I haven't had a any chilblains this winter after going gluten-free. I also no longer suffer from cold hands and feet. Has anyone else had a similar experience?

There is a case report here:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7357047/

 

[Scott Adams]

It's interesting that this appears to have been a symptom of your gluten sensitivity, and I also wonder how many others have this symptom. I ran a search of our site and got 230 hits, so it seems to be fairly common:

https://www.celiac.com/search/?q="cold hands"&quick=1&updated_after=any&sortby=relevancy

[Russ H]

I couldn't find much on autoimmune disease and chilblains apart from lupus. I found a study investigating COVID toes (that are similar to chilblains) and the sufferers had raised IgA autoantibodies. Coeliac disease does seem to be associated with vasculitis, so maybe it can cause chilblains.

[Russ H]

I just found an old paper, more of case study - 4 coeliac patients with cryoglobulinaemia. A condition were immunoglobulins reversibly precipitate out of the blood at low temperatures and cause vasculitis and skin lesions.

https://gut.bmj.com/content/13/2/112

More on cryoglobulinaemia in this link. I suppose for coeliac disease, it would be from IgA and so mixed type II/III cryoglobulinaemia.

https://www.autoimmuneregistry.org/essential-mixed-cryoglobulinemia

[knitty kitty]

I found this article...

Raynaud's phenomenon and vitamin D

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22580932/

And...

Chilblains in Turkey: a case-control study

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3938353/

 

Many Celiacs are underweight and have Vitamin D deficiency.

Edited February 19, 2022 by knitty kitty
Typo

[Russ H]

Yes, it could be malnutrition. However, coeliac disease is associated with vasculitis, and I suspect this goes beyond nutritional deficiency and is related to inmmunoglobulins.

[knitty kitty]

Vasculitis IS associated with Vitamin D Deficiency.

"Vitamin D Levels in Patients With Small and Medium Vessel Vasculitis"

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33454206/

"Conclusion: Vitamin D deficiency and insufficiency are more frequent in patients with systemic small and medium vessel vasculitis and RA"

 

[Russ H]

Chilblains are associated with anorexia and bariatric surgery, so there is certainly a nutritional factor involved. The thing about vitamin D is that it serves as a proxy for being housebound or bedbound i.e. poor general health, so low vitamin D status ends up being associated with numerous conditions even when it is not the cause.