What All Were You Tested For Before Celiac Diagnosis?

[DreamWalker]

Eeesh. Doctors can be ignorant. Reading this thread, I wonder why this disease isn't emphasized more in medical school.

Oddly, it was the positive test results for other disorders that lead a doctor (after numerous referrals) to figure out it was celiac & run the panel.

Diagnoses/tests months before I was diagnosed as celiac:

- Thyroid (+ hypo then normal then + hyper)

No one knew whether to treat me for hypothyroid or hyperthyroid so we just let it fluctuate while hunting for other things.

- Gallbladder (+) with a 24% ejection fraction then after a few months gluten free my ejection fraction was 91%. I still had that nasty thing taken out though - too much pain. (My new GI said that Celaic disease can result in bile duct disorders and was the cause of my gallbladder & pancreas issues.)

- H Pylori (-)

- Ulcers (-)

- At one point, I was told I had IBS (I Be Stumped IMHO)

- Rheumatoid Arthritis (+) yet this completely cleared up after going gluten free. I thought RH was a separate autoimmune disorder...

- Malnutrition/emaciated

Several years before being diagnosed with Celiac:

- Slightly anemic

- Lactose intolerant

- Vitamin B deficient

- Again with the thyroid

- Bulimic (by a university nurse who I TOLD NUMEROUS TIMES that I was not vomiting on purpose I couldn't hold food down and that's why I went to student health.) Then again, this is the same nurse who prescribed me cough syrup for asthma attacks. Seriously. What the hell?

- "The flu" (Student health again.) Who has the flu intermittently for ten months? During my last semester, I had "the flu" for a month straight and wound up being medically withdrawn against my will. (I lived in student housing & was labeled a risk to the university since I couldn't hold food down and was frequently passing out.)

- Asthma when I was a child that worsened until I required 5 daily meds & a "rescue" inhaler (albuterol and/or xopenex). I also had a nebulizer at home. Now I only take singulair. No asthma attacks. None! I never expected Celiac could contribute to or worsen asthma.

After being diagnosed with Celiac:

- osteoporosis & osteopoenia. Another one I don't understand. Apparently, my bone density varies throughout my body? My old GI left a vague message on my voice mail saying I had osteoporosis & to take 1.5g of calcium with Vit D per day. I ordered my records but I don't understand what the different bone-density values mean. (Well, I suppose my new GI will give me his opinion when I head back this week. It took awhile for the records to arrive. Hopefully, it's just osteopoenia....

- Now looking into bile-duct disorders since having my gallbladder taken out.... I'm still having pain issues. Yet, it immediately solved the throwing-up-bile problem that surfaced a few days before I had surgery.