Confusing Test Results

[suziq0805]

I was diagnosed with gluten sensitivity by a GI doctor and then sent to rheumatology for follow-up. The rheumatologist said that my GI doc overdiagnoses gluten sensitivity. GI said I had red intestines when I went in for a biopsy, but there was not an infection (my GI was unable to do the procedure so another doctor did). I just got a copy of the lab results from the hospital, but can't understand a darn thing! I guess I should have requested the English version Does anyone have any idea what this actually means?

The following was on the pathology report:

"Prominent Brunner's glands are present in the lamina propria and submucosa focally associated with sparse chronic inflammatory cells."

"Multiple step sections show binign fragments of antral-type mucosa with an intact surface epithelium and mild chronic inflammation of the superficial lamina propria."

It also says the biopsies were pink-tan....so I'm not sure where my doctor said I had red intestines.

This was on the final diagnosis from the pathology report:

"Stomach, Antral Biopsy- mild chronic inactive gastritis, negative for Helicobacter Pylori"

[Skylark]

Your path report shows mild, chronic inflammation of your stomach just below the top layer of cells, which is intact. Bunner's glands are in the first part of the duodenum, so they might be from a second biopsy. The "sparse chronic inflammatory cells" shouldn't be there, so your small intestine is slightly inflamed too.

I don't see how your GI could diagnose gluten intolerance from that, since a lot of things besides gluten can inflame your stomach and there aren't any celiac-like features mentioned on the duodenal biopsy.

Do you feel better off gluten? If the inflammation goes away it's a good sign that the GI was right.

[suziq0805]

Your path report shows mild, chronic inflammation of your stomach just below the top layer of cells, which is intact. Bunner's glands are in the first part of the duodenum, so they might be from a second biopsy. The "sparse chronic inflammatory cells" shouldn't be there, so your small intestine is slightly inflamed too.

I don't see how your GI could diagnose gluten intolerance from that, since a lot of things besides gluten can inflame your stomach and there aren't any celiac-like features mentioned on the duodenal biopsy.

Do you feel better off gluten? If the inflammation goes away it's a good sign that the GI was right.

Not sure if I feel better off gluten or not. My issues are muscular and neurological and have times where they "flare up" and other times where they're not too bad. I've been gluten-free for 2 months and think I need to give it longer to be able to say if my muscle pain/weakness and nerve pain is better. I have noticed I have less headaches now than at the end of my 3 month gluten challenge. Still have some...maybe 1-2 headaches a month where if I stand up I get this throbbing pain behind my eyes, but not as many as before. My gums may not be as inflammed the last couple weeks. Previously it's been so painful to floss that I've basically avoided it....awful I know and I fully realize the importance of good dental health, but when I would floss my teeth would hurt ALL day and it would be painful to eat. When I went gluten-free I notice some acne I've had on my face began to clear up- still some scars there, but it's definately better than before (when I was on my gluten challenge I thought the acne got worse too). My stools are also a bit different- I never had diarrhea but no more floating stools now that I'm gluten free...whether that's due to no gluten or possibly not enough fiber who knows.

My 21 month old is gluten-free due to reactions when we introduced solid foods and recently put him soy and lactose free also and his daipers have made a huge improvement. So we're beginning to wonder if he ever had gluten issues or if the intense vomitting was due to soy (which we discovered was in many of the foods he reacted to, but not all). We're going to reintroduce one at a time and if we discover he's soy intolerant I wonder if I could be as well.

[Skylark]

I'm sure folks with neuro issues will chime in. My understanding is that it takes a few months of really strict gluten-free to get much improvement. It took me a long time and a lot of supplements to recover from the gluten-caused bipolar. Floating stools can be fat malabsorption.

Soy can be a big problem food, as can dairy or corn. Good luck figuring it all out!

[suziq0805]

So when I googled inflammed intestine I got some links to Chron's disease. Hmmm....is it possible? I don't have diarrhea, but did often get bad stomach aches as a teen- don't remember how frequent since that was awhile ago but I just wanted to curl up when I got them. Seemed like they may have been more frequent after eating food that was greasy, had dairy or soda. But since I wasn't too concerned about it I never kept a food journal to really test that out.

[Skylark]

I don't know much about Crohn's. It's not very common and the few folks who have posted here had bad diarrhea and a lot of pain. Your GI should have ruled it out if he's any good.

[suziq0805]

Thinking back the past couple weeks I did get more headaches when I ate soy I think. Maybe I'll try taking soy out too for awhile and see what happens.