Negative Celiac Blood Panel Test

[yolmelee]

Hi-

I am new to the forum. My mom was diagnosed with Celiac disease two years ago and I recently stopped eating gluten last January because I had many of the symptoms. I just had a blood panel test done but it came back negative. Does anyone know how much gluten you are supposed to eat, and for how long, prior to the test? I don't think I ate enough (I only had one pretzel on one day, and then ate gluten once day for a week before the test). Thanks

[squirmingitch]

The medical info. I have read ranges from 2 to 3 months eating the equivalent of 3-4 slices of bread per day. HOWEVER, you had been gluten-free since Jan., that's 7 full months. That's not "the norm" so i would say IMHO, a bare minimum of 3 months & even then you may show negative. It takes time for the antibodies to build up.

[GottaSki]

Ditto - minimum of three months on significant gluten.

You may have a tough time getting gluten into you now that you have been gluten-free for over 7 months -- if your symptoms return or become worse, I'd say you have your answer that you can not eat gluten and will have to weigh the possibility of getting very sick and/or damaging your intestines against the possibility that you could ingest all that gluten and still have negative blood work.

My kids all tested negative, but with my history and improved symptoms have all remained gluten free. They have each tried at one time or another to eat gluten and each had enough reaction that it convinced them to stay gluten free.

Good Luck!

[yolmelee]

Thanks for the info! I definitely had reactions to the small amount of gluten that I ate, so I'm going to try the genetic test next.

[squirmingitch]

Many people who have gone gluten free before testing find that when they try to go back to eating gluten for testing then they are unable to tolerate it long enough to do the challenge. Most find they have much stronger reactions than they had before going gluten-free.