9/13 National Celiac Awareness Day

What is Gluten Intolerance and Celiac Disease?

Learn how you can overcome the symptoms of Gluten Intolerance and Celiac Disease with a proper exam and diagnosis. Treatment options include a modification of diet and nutritional supplementation.

Non celiac gluten intolerance is a serious problem igniting chronic inflammation in the body. The inflammation is caused by the immune system attacking the gluten. Basically, the immune system produces antibodies to the gluten. It sees the gluten as a bacteria, virus, or unwelcomed addition to the body and goes into a frenzy to eradicate it. Each time the body encounters gluten (which could be several times per day in the standard American diet) the immune system is fired up. This produces chronic inflammation which leads to chronic disease processes and a whole host of symptoms.

Gluten prompts the body to release a substance called zonulin, which regulates the permeability of the intestines. Intestinal-lining cells are pried apart by zonulin. Undigested food particles can enter the blood stream. The immune system reacts by releasing inflammatory substances. This is referred to as "leaky gut syndrome". Since, impermeability is decreased; minerals, essential vitamins, and necessary nutrients are not readily absorbed. This leads to underlying nutritional deficiencies. You may think you are eating and reaping the benefits of eating healthy foods, but the body is not absorbing as much of the nutrients as you think.

Another theory and proposed mechanism of how gluten can affect various organ systems involves peptidase enzyme called DPP4. If there is a failure or insufficiency of DPP4, the body can't efficiently breakdown the proteins in gluten. The immune system can be fooled by molecular mimicry as the undigested protein fragment can be mistaken for a virus. As a result of this, antibodies are aimed at the protein and can cause damage to tissues in an auto-immune reaction.

Symptoms of Gluten Intolerance and Celiac Disease
The symptoms that non-celiac gluten intolerance can incite can range from joint pain, anxiety, depression, headaches, fatigue, cramping, stomach pain, indigestion, body aches, rashes, acid reflux, thyroid disorders, infertility, mental disorders, etc. As you can see these symptoms are so vast and can be related to multiple diseases.

This is where the problem lies in the medical community recognizing this sensitivity as a dire health problem. Since, medicine is primarily focused on symptom relief; the majority of treatment for these symptoms is focused on pharmacology and not possible nutritional causative factors.

Proper Testing and Treatments
The best way to test for non-celiac gluten intolerance is through Muscle Testing or blood testing for IgG and IgA. In my practice, I have muscle tested many people who have been blood tested for gluten sensitivity and have been told that they do not have gluten intolerance, and they show up as sensitive to gluten through the muscle test. This may not be a life-long intolerance as there are ways to change how the body responds to gluten. One way is through testing for the right digestive enzyme that will allow the gluten to be broken down properly. Usually, my patients need to be off gluten for 6 months if not longer and if they are taking corrective nutritional supplementation their bodies can heal and tolerate gluten at some point.

There is also a desensitization process that I use to help the body to not respond to gluten in the same way. When gluten intolerance is identified, a person must refrain from eating even small amounts of gluten. The person will start feeling better in about one week. The body is so resilient and has an innate ability to heal itself, once the stress has been removed. If a person reintroduces the gluten after being gluten free, without enzymatic support or a desensitization technique, their symptoms will return.

Gluten Substitutions
Grains that do not contain gluten are rice, quinoa, buckwheat, millet, amaranth, teff, sorghum, wild rice, and corn. You can experiment by completely eliminating gluten from your diet for two weeks and replace it with some of these alternatives.

Other major food intolerance’s include soy, dairy, and corn, but a person can be sensitive to anything. What one person is sensitive to another person may be fine consuming. The majority of these sensitivities are based on genetic factors. One of the main reasons a person feels so energetic when doing a cleanse is that they may be off their major food sensitivity, such as wheat or dairy.

Chiropractic Adjustments by manual or activator techniques may be used to help relieve your nervous system of nervous system interference, which causes multiple symptoms dependent on relieve your nervous system of nervous system interference, which causes multiple symptoms dependent on where your nerves are being affected. If your nervous system can not communicate with your body, it simply can't take care of you optimally.

Please contact me if you, or someone you know suspects they may be suffering from Gluten, or any other type of food In-tolerances. A muscle test will provide a quick diagnosis and options for healthy solutions.