Confused By Test Results

[Rothane]

After going gluten-free at home with my husband, who was diagnosed with celiac disease, I noticed that when I ate out and ate wheat, I'd have some digestive issues. I wasn't sure if this was from eating out or whether I too might have an issue with gluten. I had an appointment with my allergist in the end of October anyway, and asked to be tested.

I got my results back, and the numbers look like this:

*TGA, IGA 5.4 (doctor wrote "negative celiac disease")

Negative <20.0

Weak Positive 20.0 - 30.0

Moderate to Strong Positive > 30.0

But then these other numbers appeared with checkmarks, and no explanation:

* IGA 157

* IGE 25

So, I'm a little confused. Can anyone clarify? I have no idea what these second two numbers, and that triple-digit number looks a bit ominous.

...Rothane

[ravenwoodglass]

If you are mostly gluten free the blood testing is worthless. If you feel you need a diagnosis you need to go back to a full gluten diet for about 3 months and then retest. Or you could eliminate it completely and then challenge it by eating something like cream of wheat 3 times a day for a week. If your body reacts to that challenge (gluten) it is telling you the answer. IMHO if you are getting sick whenever you eat out and that is the only time you are getting gluten it is not a coincidence.

If those numbers that were checked were tests for IGA and IGE antibodies then it would appear that your IGA is highly elevated and your IGE might be also, without the ranges it is hard to tell. But those would be positive markers for celiac if they are high.

The IGA could be your total IGA, then the numbers would be in the normal range. But the lab slip should say that it was a total IGA and it should give another set of numbers and ranges for the antibody IGA results.

Do you have a copy of the actual lab results with the other ranges included?