Celiac Blood Results

[TinyOrchid]

I recently went to my doctor to have a Celiac panel, and the results seemed to have indicated a "negative." However, I have been on a Gluten Free diet for 2 years now after consulting with a previous doctor who suggested I may have a gluten intolerance and recommended a gluten-free diet to alleviate my symptoms. It worked. Prior to the gluten-free diet my symptoms included:

Abdominal pain (would be doubled over with sharp pain)

Loose stools ("frothy" etc, I know, gross, but everyone here has experienced that I'm sure)

Bouts of constipation/diarrhea

Extreme Bloat (after eating something with gluten my stomach distends extremely, looks like I'm pregnant)

Lots of gas

Migraines

Night Blindness

Fatigue

Tingling in hands and feet

Irregular menstruation (Gyn cannot determine why I am still skipping periods, even with birth control did not regulate them)

Bone pain (feels like deep ache, usually in arms and at night)

Joint pain

Insomnia

Loss of tooth enamel (had this problem since I was young despite brushing 2-3 times a day and even given special rinses from dentist to improve, only gluten-free diet seemed to stop progression)

Hives (If I handle gluten for an extended period of time, I get hives/itchy rash on my abdomen)

Respiratory Infections

Hair loss (more shedding than what is considered normal)

Canker sores (happen only after consuming gluten)

Irritability

Slightly elevated TSH (Hypothyroid?)

After being on gluten-free diet for about 2 years, all of this went away accept when the occasional cross contamination or accident occurred where I was exposed to gluten. I knew right away and would run to check the ingredients on what I ate etc to figure out what it was that caused the problem, and sure enough, every time symptoms returned there had been gluten exposure.

Before taking the antibody test I consumed gluten for 3 days and immediately symptoms returned. My stomach distended within 20 minutes and I looked pregnant, I got a migraine and felt dizzy, nauseous, sick to my stomach etc. It has been about a week and I'm still "detoxing" my system, my stools are still a little loose and have a canker sore which is healing. Was unable to get out of bed, felt sick all day, didn't want to eat, but forced myself to for the sake of the test.

My doctor only ran 2 of the celiac tests, the results were:

TTG Antibody (IGG) <3 (<7 = positive result)

Endomysial AB (IGA) Negative

My family also has a history of autoimmune diseases:

Grandfather has IBS, symptomatic of Celiac but refuses to be screened

Grandmother has Diabetes

Mother has Hashimotos Thyroid and Celiac symptomatic

Brother has severe Chron's disease

Because of my brother's Chron's the doctors said I had a 50% chance of developing Chron's and a 75%+ chance of having Celiacs. My own research correlates to those statements as there seems to be a very common thread between chron's and celiacs.

Anyway, I was just curious what you all thought about the symptoms and to get some feedback. =)

[Mother of Jibril]

It does seem quite possible that you have celiac disease... at the very least, you're obviously intolerant to gluten. I'm not surprised that your panel came back negative, however. It takes time to cause enough damage for a diagnosis of celiac disease... like three MONTHS, not three days At this point, IMO, you basically have three options:

1) Assume you have celiac disease and stay on a strict gluten-free diet for the rest of your life.

2) Do a proper gluten challenge for three months under a doctor's close supervision. You still might not get a positive result, but at least it would be a fair shot.

3) Get a genetic test. When mine came back positive for DQ8 I felt like I made a really GOOD decision to eliminate gluten from my diet. Ten months later I'm still not tempted to cheat!! However... if you're not positive for DQ2.5 or DQ8, don't feel like you're home free. It's still possible (though less likely) to have celiac disease. Plus... even if your intestinal villi are OK with gluten, the rest of your body might not be.

[Foxfire62]

I recently went to my doctor to have a Celiac panel, and the results seemed to have indicated a "negative." However, I have been on a Gluten Free diet for 2 years now after consulting with a previous doctor who suggested I may have a gluten intolerance and recommended a gluten-free diet to alleviate my symptoms. It worked. Prior to the gluten-free diet my symptoms included:

Abdominal pain (would be doubled over with sharp pain)

Loose stools ("frothy" etc, I know, gross, but everyone here has experienced that I'm sure)

Bouts of constipation/diarrhea

Extreme Bloat (after eating something with gluten my stomach distends extremely, looks like I'm pregnant)

Lots of gas

Migraines

Night Blindness

Fatigue

Tingling in hands and feet

Irregular menstruation (Gyn cannot determine why I am still skipping periods, even with birth control did not regulate them)

Bone pain (feels like deep ache, usually in arms and at night)

Joint pain

Insomnia

Loss of tooth enamel (had this problem since I was young despite brushing 2-3 times a day and even given special rinses from dentist to improve, only gluten-free diet seemed to stop progression)

Hives (If I handle gluten for an extended period of time, I get hives/itchy rash on my abdomen)

Respiratory Infections

Hair loss (more shedding than what is considered normal)

Canker sores (happen only after consuming gluten)

Irritability

Slightly elevated TSH (Hypothyroid?)

After being on gluten-free diet for about 2 years, all of this went away accept when the occasional cross contamination or accident occurred where I was exposed to gluten. I knew right away and would run to check the ingredients on what I ate etc to figure out what it was that caused the problem, and sure enough, every time symptoms returned there had been gluten exposure.

Before taking the antibody test I consumed gluten for 3 days and immediately symptoms returned. My stomach distended within 20 minutes and I looked pregnant, I got a migraine and felt dizzy, nauseous, sick to my stomach etc. It has been about a week and I'm still "detoxing" my system, my stools are still a little loose and have a canker sore which is healing. Was unable to get out of bed, felt sick all day, didn't want to eat, but forced myself to for the sake of the test.

My doctor only ran 2 of the celiac tests, the results were:

TTG Antibody (IGG) <3 (<7 = positive result)

Endomysial AB (IGA) Negative

My family also has a history of autoimmune diseases:

Grandfather has IBS, symptomatic of Celiac but refuses to be screened

Grandmother has Diabetes

Mother has Hashimotos Thyroid and Celiac symptomatic

Brother has severe Chron's disease

Because of my brother's Chron's the doctors said I had a 50% chance of developing Chron's and a 75%+ chance of having Celiacs. My own research correlates to those statements as there seems to be a very common thread between chron's and celiacs.

Anyway, I was just curious what you all thought about the symptoms and to get some feedback. =)

Going on a gluten diet for 3 days will probably not significantly raise your tTg levels, I wouldn't think. I'm no doctor, of course, but 3 days is really not enough. Two weeks would be better, or even a month, but I'm guessing you wouldn't be able to tolerate that anymore.

The only real way of diagnosis is a biopsy. Again, you would probably need to consume gluten longer than just a few days.

If you've been fine on a gluten-free diet, why bother for a diagnosis? I would recommend just staying away from gluten entirely. Unless you require this diagnosis for a particular reason, I would just stay gluten-free and not worry about it.