Celiac And Hashimoto's Disease

[pattianne]

I am a mom of a 17yr old daughter who was diagnosed with celiac's in Febuary 2011. Her ttg was 85 and she had a positive endoscopy. She has no symptoms of celiac but was screened by our family dr, because of her already having Hashimoto's (Hypothyroid).

Her follow up ttg level after 5 months is 30. And her thyroid function is now boarding hyperthyroid.

I was wondering if anyone has experienced this fluctutation with their thyroid after being gluten free.

[Gemini]

I am a mom of a 17yr old daughter who was diagnosed with celiac's in Febuary 2011. Her ttg was 85 and she had a positive endoscopy. She has no symptoms of celiac but was screened by our family dr, because of her already having Hashimoto's (Hypothyroid).

Her follow up ttg level after 5 months is 30. And her thyroid function is now boarding hyperthyroid.

I was wondering if anyone has experienced this fluctutation with their thyroid after being gluten free.

Absolutely! This is common to those of us with both conditions and the reason is your daughter may be absorbing more of her meds now that she has been healing. It happened to me but it took longer to happen as I went many years with undiagnosed Celiac and was older. I went seriously hyperthyroid and had to re-figure the correct dosage of Nature-throid. It is also common for the thyroid to swing a bit in people with Hashi's as it is autoimmune in nature so stress or other factors may affect function. The longer she is gluten free, the better control she will have over both conditions.

Kudos to your doctor for recognizing that Hashi's is often associated with Celiac and testing her! That rarely happens.

[joyw4]

Just received a positive result from my celiac panel. I am so confused though because I was reading that people with hypothyriodism have false positive results for celiac being that it is also an autoimmune disease. I was dx with graves disease at age 17. Had a thyroidectomy and now have hypothyriodism (hashimotos). Now at 40 and after being so sick for so long there may be finally can answer. I am frustrated because now they want to do a biopsy to confirm it and I'm scared it could be negative. That the blood results were positive because of the hypothyriodism. What do you think. Oh my father was dx this past year with celiac. His blood work was negative but the biopsy was positive. Would appreciate your opinion. Thanks!

[eatmeat4good]

Any degree of positive is a positive on the Celiac blood panel.

The biopsy may or may not be positive but you are allowed to go gluten free and see if it helps you. You only have to eat gluten until the biopsy is taken. Then you can eliminate it. Many people have positive blood work and negative biopsy. AND many people do not test positive on either but still have relief from being gluten free.

It sounds like you really want to try the gluten free diet to see if it helps you with your symptoms, and I think you should give it a good strict try after you have had all the testing you want to have. I opted not to test. I have Hashimoto's and Celiac (by dietary challenge). After being sick for years, NOW every Dr. I see wants me to be tested for Celiac by intestinal biopsy. But that doesn't make sense to me at all. I won't intentionally eat gluten no matter what they say. If they had suggested it when I was so sick I couldn't get out of bed, I probably would have had it done. No one can make this decision but you. It is very likely that you already have your answer. I've never heard of the hashimoto's interfering with Celiac testing, but the two often occur together. Good luck and I hope your testing is done soon, so you can see if being gluten free really helps you.