Gluten-free diet

[Jazzy]

Gluten-free foods are seen more and more these days at restaurants and grocery stores.

That's great for the 1 percent of people who have celiac disease, says CBS News chief medical correspondent Dr. Jon LaPook. However, many people on these diets don't have the condition, and worse, many people who shouldn't eat gluten due to celiac have no idea they have the disease.

They may frequently feel ill after eating, when a gluten-free diet could turn their symptoms around completely. For those with celiac disease, "once you go on the gluten-free diet...you can feel a lot better, just like a flower getting some water in it," says LaPook. "You can blossom."

Celiac disease is an autoimmune reaction in which you're very sensitive to a protein component of wheat called gluten, LaPook explained. This reaction over time can cause inflammation that damages the lining of the small intestine, preventing absorption of necessary nutrients.

Years ago, doctors only looked for celiac disease in patients who were very sick with severe abdominal pain, diarrhea and weight loss. But more recently, doctors have learned there can be far more subtle signs: Bloating, constipation, fatigue, brain fog (due to lack of iron absorption), infertility, migraines or being short in stature.

The treatment for it is avoiding food with gluten, such as most bread or pasta and many processed foods that contain wheat, rye or barley.

Full article

Are any of you on a gluten-free diet or know anyone who is? If so, has it helped?

 

[Nebulous's iconNebulous]

No bread? No sandwiches ever again?

 

[DrLeftover]

You can buy gluten free bread in many supermarkets.

http://www.rudisbakery.com/gluten-free/products/

and

http://shop.udisglutenfree.com/ppcdo/search/google?gclid=CJX-r5_d67gCFYWe4Aod3xUAKA

As well as make your own.

I like these from the Bob's Red Mill.

Their pizza crust is excellent and I use their GF bread mix in the bread machine once in awhile.

http://www.bobsredmill.com/gluten-free/

And, my daughters love the GF brownie mix, even though they don't find wheat digestively unpopular. Yet.

 

[Kahnai]

Wait, so eating gluten can make you short...

Gluten free diet here I come! I need to be taller!

All joking aside, I'm glad they're offering this. I didn't even know what gluten was until I was working in the cafeteria at my school a year or so back and this girl asked for gluten free noodles and I didn't have a clue what she was talking about. She got real upset at me, I don't know why I had never heard of it before...

 

[DrLeftover]

As with many things, there is a range of symptoms that start with the very mild, almost unnoticeable intolerance, such as a mild case of the 'trots' or a light rash, all the way up to the disease described above that can be life threatening.

If you have some unexplained digestive issues, or maybe a bunch of pimples that come up only when you "overdose" on pasta, try going without wheat and other high gluten foods for a couple of weeks and see what happens. Then, if you eat a substantial amount of wheat products, like a sub roll, and the symptoms return, it might be worth looking into.

And it is worth noting here:

No, people 'back in the day' did not have these issues to this extent. And the 'people' have not changed.

The manufacturing of the products has changed, and many of these items now have extra gluten added to them for 'shelf stability', appearance, and other reasons.

AND

The wheat has changed. It has been bred, and indeed, been engineered, to have more and longer strands of gluten protein in it for essentially the same reasons.