How Long Will Villi Damage Show On Biopsy?

[boysmom]

I am 100% convinced I am reacting to gluten. The question is what the cause is. I have been gluten-free for about 2 months now and I simply do not think I can tolerate a long enough gluten challenge to be effective. At this point one small cross-contamination leads to a night of misery and 2 days of incapacitating lethargy. I just found evidence in my baby book that looks very likely to me that this may have been an issue when I was 1 month old. *IF* I'm right and I've had this all my life (I'm 47 now) I'm wondering whether the damage would still be able to show on biopsy at this point. Do doctors rebiopsy regularly to check your progress as you recover? if so, how often were you tested and how long was it before your biopsy looked normal again? I guess I'm wondering whether a biopsy would be a waste of time at this point ( and I know even if it had been done before I quit eating gluten it could have shown negative, but I'm trying to guess what the chances are that it would show).

Thanks,

Luanne

[chasbari]

We finally came to the conclusion I was dealing with Celiac shortly before Thanksgiving this past November and went gluten-free even though I had no diagnosis and everyone was cautioning about how it would prevent a proper diagnosis. Sure enough, the blood test was negative but my doctor was very willing to continue down the diagnosis path because of all the anecdotal information and my initial positive response to gluten-free. The initial imaging they did on my abdomen also showed some areas of concern so the endoscope was ordered. I had that about six weeks after starting gluten-free and the Gastro took one look at the villous atrophy and said it was a no brainer on the diagnosis. This was after the gluten-free Paleo was making me feel much better. Don't know if this helps at all and I think I was very fortunate to have a very cooperative group of physicians throughout the process. Oh, formal DX was given in February. I have not had any follow up imaging or biopsy as of yet and don't think will do any until a year has passed so I am not familiar with what the typical follow up would be.