Celiac Disease Or Not ?

[radian]

A very good friend of mine became sick and went to the hospital. She was told by her doctor that she had Celiac Disease. She immediately went on a Glutin free diet. She is very careful about what she eats and all her test have been coming back good. However she likes to drink Beer. This does not seem to affect her in any way. This brings me to the question of why? All the reading that I do on this disease tells me that Beer is very bad and should be affecting her.

She just went in for a check up last week and her doctor said that she was doing very well and that the results of her tests are excellent. How could this be? I personally know that she has drank a lot of beer in the last few months prior to her checkup and her results came back excellent.

Any information on this would be helpful. I am beginning to wonder if her original Diagnosis was accurate.

[lovegrov]

Beer, as long as it isn't a wheat beer, actually has only a small amount of gluten. Barley isn't nearly as toxic as wheat and there's only a small amount of barley in a beer. Some also claim the brewing process takes out the harmful part but I don't believe this is true (distilling is another matter).

The main problem here is that even though your friend is not reacting, nobody can be sure whether some sort of silent damage is happening. I'm sure I could drink beer with no apparent reaction but I choose to err on the side of caution. So I drink rum!!

richard

[Littlewolf]

My BF can drink beer on occation and he is a Celiac. However, he does notice a small bit of a reaction. It all depends on the sensitivity.

I would suggest she lay off the beer, as mentioned before. Even if it doesn't effect her, if it builds up in her system she could be feeling it later. It's good you worry about her but it's her choice.