August 13, 2012 • 24 mins
What is celiac disease? Why have rates of celiac disease been rising in the U.S.? Are gluten-free diets good for everybody? Join Caroline and Cristen as they take a closer look at celiac disease and gluten-free diets.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff Mom Never told You?
From housetop works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Kristen and I'm Caroline, and today we are tackling
(00:23):
Celiac disease, tackling it, taking it out, taking it out,
taking it on, and talk about where it came from,
why all of a sudden in the past few years
it seems to be everywhere, and what the deal is
with the gluten free lifestyle? Ye, what does it have
to do with Miley Cyrus. Yeah, So basically we're going
(00:45):
to tackle Celiac disease and Miley Cyrus right to boil
it down for you. But what to kick things off
is Celiac disease exactly? Well, Kristen, it happens to be
a digestive condition triggered by eating gluten, which is a
protein found in foods containing wheat, barley, or rye. So basically,
(01:05):
people with this condition candy, bread, pasta, cookies, pizza, or
anything else that makes me happy in my life. Yeah,
I mean, there are ways which will get to where
you can eat those things. But it has to be
made with specialty kinds of ingredients that do not contain gluten.
And the reason why gluten triggers this problem with people
(01:27):
with celiac is that, um, there is an immune reaction
in the small intestine that damages hair like structures that
coat the inside of our intestines called vel i, and
those vally help the body absorb nutrients. And if the
vel i get damaged, he just poop out the nutrients.
(01:49):
Oh dear, he just poop it out. What is okay? Well,
that's good. Uh. It also causes a loss of calcium
and bone density, so that is definitely something for women
in particular to think about, lactose intolerance, cancer, and neurological complications.
So if things are upset in your tummy, if you
have a tinder tummy, you have a lot of other
things to worry about. But you might not even have
(02:11):
a tinder tummy if you do, in fact have celiac,
because it can happen without symptoms, and as the Mayo
client points out, there isn't one set of symptoms that
happens to everybody, which is why it can be kind
of hard to a diagnose among those symptoms. So that
you might get could include things like abdominal pain, diarrhea.
(02:35):
Since we've talked about the upset stomach, um irritability, or depression,
there was a new study that we found um linking
heightened depression in women with Celiac disease. They haven't looked
at it in men. It was just focused on women.
But there does seem to be that mental health aspect
of it. Muscle cramps, skin rash, mouth sores, grape poop,
(02:58):
grape poop, grape poop. That's terrifying. Yeah, a lot of
these A lot of these symptoms are malnutrition related because,
like Kristen said, when you're you're small, intestine has damaged.
When when the lining of its damage, you're not getting
those nutrients you need. So you know, you might think
that you're getting enough food, you're putting enough food in
your mouth, but you're not getting the nutrients out of it.
And so you might wonder what causes this? Why have
(03:20):
I been struck down with Celiac disease? Nobody knows. Nobody knows.
It does seem to be more common in women, according
to the National Institutes of Health. Also more common at
least used to be in non Hispanic white folk of
European ancestry, but that is also starting to change as well,
(03:46):
and as it has started to branch out among other
ethnicities and all around the world, not just in in
Europe and now in the US. The rate of Celiac
disease has gone up, according to a study those published
in July in the American Journal of gastro Entrology. Well,
at the same time that the rates are going up,
(04:09):
a lot of people do not even realize that they
have it. And from this Mayo Clinic study that was
published in August, they said that one point for million
of the estimated one point eight million Americans with Celiac
disease are unaware they have it, which is crazy because
that's a majority of the sufferers of Celiac disease. And
(04:29):
so the researchers said that the rate of the disease
in the US is one and one forty one, which
is similar to the rate in European countries. So again
there's that tie. Yeah, and um, the study also confirmed
that it's four times more common today in the US
for someone to get to celiac diagnosis than it was
(04:50):
fifty years ago. And these researchers um the study that
we're referencing is coming out of the Mayo Clinic that
was a team of gastro urologists that we're looking at
this problem and trying to puzzle out why there's been
this spike. And according to UM, what they told CBS
News about their study was that it might have to
(05:12):
do with how wheat is grown. Essentially, back in the
nineteen fifties, UH scientists started crossbreeding wheat to be heartier
and easier to produce. But those changes in how we
bread wheat may have altered the structure of gluten, making
(05:32):
it harder for some of our bodies to process. And
not to mention, we eat so much more processed food
now than we used to, but our diets have have
gotten a lot worse. Yeah, And I mean, I wonder
if that has to do with the spread of Celiac
disease across the world, the fact that they're noticing these
increased rates and other ethnicities and countries and areas of
(05:54):
the world that maybe didn't see it as often as
we are now. So maybe it's just more cheesy poofs
are moving around the globe, all those cheesy poofs. It
always goes back to the poofs um Yeah, in the
United States, just a good an idea of how quickly
this has come on our public health radar. According to
(06:14):
a New York Times magazine from two thousand ten, Celiac
disease wasn't considered a public health issue until two thousand three,
and that was largely because of the efforts of a
very small number of doctors who were looking into why
this disease hadn't translated from Europe over to the US,
(06:39):
and they realized that there was a lot of under
diagnosis that was going on. Yeah, and the doctors really
didn't think that Celiac disease was that big of a
deal that not many people had it, it was pretty contained.
But Dr Alessio Fasano of the University of Maryland found
that out of two thousand blood samples, one and two
d and fifty tested positive for the disease. He followed
(07:01):
it up with that two thousand three study, massive study
and found that out of thirteen thousand subjects, one and
a hundred and thirty three people had it, and among
the relatives of those people the rate was one in
twenty two. So obviously, if your mom, your sister, whoever
in your family has it, you have a much higher
risk of developing it. Right, and also probably because as
(07:22):
we mentioned earlier, there aren't hallmark symptoms of celiac disease,
saying you know X, Y, and Z, that means that
you have it. Um, the diagnosis might be tricky. And
the three main ways that doctors can diagnose celia diseases
through blood testing, genetic testing because of that genetic link
that you just mentioned caroline, or biopsies of the small intestine,
(07:44):
which would probably test whether or not those vl i,
those hair like structures um are intact or not. And
the vl I now, as a side note, are now
making me envisioned the inside of our small intestines as
a shag carpet. No, I'm picturing it more is like
(08:05):
those little you know, those little sea creatures that like
kind of pink and they kind of like, oh that's nice.
That's sides have been a burnt orange shag carpet, crows
or the floor of a hair salon. Um. Yeah, speaking
of these tests that Kristen was just mentioning, I'm yeah,
I'm totally glossing over that. By the way, um Quest Diagnostics,
(08:26):
a testing company told The New York Times for that
article that requests for Celiac blood test have jumped since
two thousand nine. So I feel like it's kind of
feeding into itself. The more you hear about Celiac disease,
and the more you think, well, gosh, I'm bloated, maybe
I have it. My poop's gray. So I'm not trying
to make light of Celiac disease. I just got great
(08:48):
poop on my brain. It's hard to get it off
the brain. Um. But yeah, so now more people are
are are getting tested, and and you know now that
I'm doing all this research for celia disease, of course
I think I have it. Oh No, I get tired,
I get bloated. You got the grape poops. No, I
don't have the grape poops. Um. But yeah, I can
(09:10):
see how people would think, well, I have these very
vague general symptoms, maybe I have celia casese. Maybe out
cut gluten out of my diet. Well yeah, and some
and some folks too will because of all of those
gastro intestinal symptoms, think maybe it's irritable bowe syndrome, all
sorts of things, Crown's disease. Yeah, all the stuff it
could be going on, when in fact it is the gluten.
(09:33):
And speaking of the gluten, here's here's a big problem. Well,
one of the problems with Celiac disease. Once you find
out you have it, it'sund like you can pop a
pill and your symptoms go away. So far, the closest
thing that medical researchers have found to a cure is gluten.
(09:54):
Removing gluten from your diet. Yeah, eating, I mean eating
pretty cleanly, you know, fruits, vegetables, meats, just don't get
crazy with the pizza crust. A New York Times article
talked about how expensive it can be to have Celiac
disease and have this lifestyle where you have to eat
special food because gluten free products run nearly three times
(10:17):
as expensive as regular products. But in places like Brittain
and Italy, a lot of gluten free products are at
least partially covered by insurance. If your doctors think that
all this food is causing you digestive problems if you
have Celiac disease, then you can get it kind of
covered by your insurance. Right and uh, also, the one
of the reasons why gluten free products may cost so
(10:39):
much is because in order to avoid gluten, this is
the list of stuff that you've got to cut out
in addition to just your run of the mill wheat flour. Okay,
we've got barley, bulgar, durham, farina, I don't even know
it for reina is dinnis farina. You avoid that mustache,
(10:59):
graham flower our rye rise. Yeah, no, beer, some molina
and spelt, which is a form of wheat. And speaking
of beer, a friend of mine is on the gluten
free thing. I tried one of her gluten free beers. Yeah,
I don't know. It tasted it didn't. It wasn't the same, Yeah,
(11:21):
it wasn't the same. Ever, is does she actually have
Celiac disease or gluten sensitivity. She does have a confirmed
gluten sensitivity. I'm not sure if it's full blown celiac,
but she was having a number of gastro intestinal problems
and once she eliminated the gluten, the symptoms have gotten
much better. Interesting, Yeah, but the beer has gotten worse unfortunately.
(11:45):
M Well, gluten sensitivity. Uh, it's the label for people
who stuff are bloating and other symptoms like your friend,
like your poor friend, and they seem to be helped
by avoiding gluten, but they don't actually have Celiac disease
like you said, um, but there are a lot of
people who were doing this little self diagnosedis things who
were cutting wheat and gluten out of their diets without
(12:06):
having talked to a doctor. So that mayo study that
we started earlier. Um It's co author, gastro intrologist Joseph
Murray said, there are a lot of people on a
gluten free diet and it's not clear what the medical
need for that is. It is important if someone thinks
they might have Celiac disease that they'd be tested first
(12:26):
before they go on the diet. And you know, I
mentioned sweet Little Miley Cyrus earlier. There was this whole
like firestorm on Twitter because she posted something. People thought
she was antarexic, and she posted this thing about no,
I have a wheat allergy, Um, I have celiac or
a sensitivity or whatever, and so you should try it
to She told everybody should cut gluten out of their diets.
It's like, wait, wait, you are not a physician, and
(12:49):
I think you're fourteen years old, so just real it
in there. It's a gluten free party in the USA.
It's my Miley Cyrus jokey like that I do. Yeah.
And there was also tennis sensation Novak Jakovic, who attributed
his massive winning streak that he had like a year
ago or something to his gluten free lifestyle because he
(13:13):
found out a prior year that he had celiac. So
he cut the gluten and all of a sudden he
was a powerhouse on the tennis court, which fueled kind
of like the whole Miley Cyrus gluten free party in
the USA thing. Um, this idea that uh you know, yeah,
gluten free is gonna make you look fabulous. Yeah, like
(13:34):
clear up your skin, make you run faster, make you
jump higher. It's like a pair of Nikes. Um. So
there have been a lot of market research firms that
have projected how much Americans will end up spending on
gluten free products every year. And while there is a
core group of customers that that need it for medical reasons,
a lot of people are just part of this fat diet,
(13:56):
like I want to lose weight, let's just cut out
all the gluten and I at the whole like the
whole diet about cutting carbs, and everything. Cutting out sugar
because you know that does help lower inflammation in your
digestive system. It could be beneficial. But people really think
this gluten free diet is going to help them lose
weight because maybe they feel bloated one day and they're like, oh, well,
I felt better afterwards. But there's not actually a scientific
(14:20):
basis for it. But it is definitely driving this humongous
billion dollar market for gluten free products. Yeah, we there
were a number of different um sources that we saw
estimating the worth of the gluten free industry, and it
was anywhere between three and seven billion dollars right now.
It's a lot of dollars, especially for something that really
(14:42):
hasn't been at the forefront of you know, public health
concerns for very long at all. And the thing is, too,
if you are considering, we're not We're not saying don't
don't eat you know, eat the gluten, eat the wheat everybody.
We're not saying that. But something to keep in mind
if you are looking to trim the gluten or even
(15:05):
go gluten free if a doctor has recommended it, just
remember that if you are buying gluten free versions of
pizza cookies, highly processed food. Even though the gluten is
gone there, it still might not be the healthiest substitute
for plain old pizza in normal cookies right as Elizabeth Policy,
(15:28):
the nutrition director at the DUP Diet and Fitness Center
and Durham, North Carolina, said, a gluten free brownie is
still a brownie. Still a brownie. Yeah, she says. Often
gluten free products are packed with saturated fat, cholesterol, and
sugar just to improve taste. To that, I say, have
a strawberry instead of your gluten free brownie. And Nancy Copperman,
who's the director of Public health Initiatives at a New
(15:50):
York Health System, said that gluten free food isn't necessarily
lighter in calories. And one thing too that's very important
for people going gluten free or gluten light is that
they need to make sure they're getting enough iron, calcium, zinc,
and be vitamins, because that is one thing that gluten
(16:12):
does provide is a lot of those those nutrients. So
a lot of times if you're going gluten free, you
need to be taken some supplements as well. And I
think to all of this, we say, you know, talk
to your doc or your nurse practitioner absolutely and CBS
but CBS story did point out that people who actually
if you're if you're thinking of this in terms of
(16:33):
weight loss, if you want to cut out things from
your diet to lose weight, um, people who actually do
have Celiac disease may actually gain weight on a gluten
free diet because they can finally absorb nutrients. When you
cut out the stuff that's hurting you, it lets your
body heal itself, and it restores the intestines ability to
absorb those necessary nutrients from food, and so Comperment who
(16:55):
I just mentioned does warn like Kristen said that if
you're hutting stuff out from your diet, you really have
to be careful that you're still getting the stuff you need.
So you could end up hurting yourself and putting yourself
at a health disadvantage just because you think that cutting
out X Y Z is going to make you thin.
And as far as the whole question of whether or not,
(17:16):
you know, should everybody go gluten free? Is it the
is it the best kind of lifestyle that we could have?
I think that it's it's yet another lesson in not
so much having to you know, cut out all carbs
cut out, all gluten cut out, you know this and that,
but more just a reiteration of being mindful of what
you're putting into your body and how it makes you feel.
(17:39):
Because I do notice if I get on um, if
I get really busy and I end up eating more
processed food than I normally do, it does make me
feel sluggish and blurated and and not quite myself. Yeah,
we all should aspire to eat healthy and clean and
and good, but you know, sometimes you get home at
night and you're like, I'm just gonna pop open those
(18:01):
cheesy poofs and I call it a day. I want
those poofs. But one thing, one thing Kristen touched on
that I would like to talk a little bit more
about is Celiac disease and women in particular. According to
the National Foundation for Celiac Awareness, the disease can actually
affect the reproductive system, resulting in infertility, miscarriages, still birth,
and adverse pregnancy outcomes. They said that the average age
(18:24):
of diagnosis is about forty five, but the time to
receive that diagnosis it's about ten years. So that means
that the entire span of the reproductive cycle may have
been interrupted if you've been having fertility problems this entire time.
I'm not saying I'm not saying that you do, but
I'm just saying, like, it is kind of scary to
think that you're small intestine, what you think is just
(18:45):
a little stomach problem could actually be interfering with your
ability to get pregnant. And they did point out that
women in the general population are diagnosed with Celiac disease
two to three times more often than men, and studies
indicate that celia disease may occur and as many as
four to eight per of women with unexplained infertility, So
there's there. There is a definite link there. Yeah. And
(19:08):
one thing that we didn't mention as well is that
childhood rates of Celiac disease are also up. I think
among the adult population four times more common than it
used to be fifty years ago, among the uh adolescent
population five times more common. So I gotta watch out
what we're eating and what those little kiddos are eating too. Yeah,
(19:30):
and please go to your doctor if you think that
you're sick. Don't don't just take our word for it
that if you're bloated, you have Celiac disease. Never take
our word for anything, obviously, we don't want to get
in trouble. That's all this is about. Uh So yeah, um,
Celiac disease, gluten free diet, Let us know your thoughts
about all of it. Mom Stuff at Discovery dot com
(19:52):
is where you can send your letter, especially for people
who have gone gluten free and felt some kind of
effects that be care used to know what what that
experience has been like. And also people with because glue,
going gluten free can be expensive and also difficult to
cook with. Anyone who has good resources for gluten free
(20:14):
recipes let us know so we can share them with everybody.
Mom stuff at Discovery dot com or head over to
the Facebook so you can instantly share it with all
of our listeners. In the meantime, we've got a couple
of letters here to share with you. This email is
from Kirsten about our Jockstraps episode because people cannot get
(20:36):
enough of it. Uh She said, I played field hockey
as a goalkeeper from middle school through the Division one
level in college, and almost every goalkeeper I knew or
met in the nine years that I played were a
pelvic protector. It looks similar to a male jock strap
with a wide waist band and straps that go around
your legs, but has a hard, triangular shaped front piece
that protects the lady parts. It was a standard issued
(20:58):
piece of equipment even when I began playing in school. Yes,
it was uncomfortable at first, but after you took one
hard shot directly to that region, you were forever thankful
to be wearing it. Sometimes shots would come at you
too quickly or at a strange angle, and you simply
didn't have time to react quickly enough. I've been hit
in that area several times, and especially when it happened
in college, I was incredibly happy she put that in
(21:18):
all caps, that I was wearing the pelvic protector. I
was always really embarrassed to wear it when I was younger,
but eventually learned to become proud of it. After all,
the alternative was getting a bruised pelvis and risking damage
to the reproductive organs. As a young player, we were
always worn that forgetting to or not wearing a pelvic
protector was risking our ability to have kids in the
future if we so chose. As a young player, we
were always worn that forgetting to or not wearing a
(21:40):
pelvic protector was risking our ability to have kids in
the future. So thanks Kristen Well. I have an email
here from Amanda and this is in reference to our
show way back When in two thousand nine on women
in the Military. And Amanda has been in the military
um since she was eighteen and listening in the Marine
(22:04):
Corps and she's now an Army National Guard soldier. She
returned from Iraq in December two thousand eleven and is
awaiting deployment to Afghanistan. Uh So, she writes, while on
the Marine Corps, my options and occupation were very limited
and left little room for advancement. The Marine Corps prides
(22:24):
themselves on being the few, while female Marine Corps are
the few among the few. The mantra of every marine
rifleman is true. When it comes to our social roles.
We are still restricted to the confines of being the
lesser Marine, since we are not allowed to perform or
assists in combat arms. After completing my obligatory contract with
(22:46):
that service, a transition to the Army National Guard. So
moving forward in her letter to when she goes to Iraq,
she writes, our Army National Guard Company escorted commodity trucks
in mind resistant ambush protected vehicles throughout the country and
out of the country, successfully closing out the American military
presence within those borders. During this operation, four of the
(23:10):
ten females myself included were gunners on multiple missions, handling
machine guns, M fours, flares, and an assortment of other
protective weapons ensuring the safety of the convoy. The male
soldiers of the cia V company became our family, many
like brothers and a few like fathers. There were no
instances of sexual harassment or demeaning overtures within the company.
(23:31):
I can honestly say that of the one thirty one
soldiers I served with in this company, not one would
allow for any treatment subpar par or not in good
standing with blood ties. But that said, I'm proud to
serve my country and humbled by the incredible dedication and
courage I have seen in my federal fellow battle buddies,
male and female, in all uniform branches. As a sergeant,
(23:53):
I have seen seventeen year old boys and girls turned
into strong American men and women, and I am grateful
every day for the heart of those who choose to
serve so thanks everyone who's written in mom Stuff at
Discovery dot Com is where you can send your letters,
or you can find us on Facebook or follow us
on Twitter at Mom's Stuff Podcast, and of course you
can find out what we're doing during the week over
(24:15):
at our website. It's how stuff works dot com for
more on this and thousands of other topics. Is it
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reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff Mom Never told You?
From housetop works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Kristen and I'm Caroline, and today we are tackling
(00:23):
Celiac disease, tackling it, taking it out, taking it out,
taking it on, and talk about where it came from,
why all of a sudden in the past few years
it seems to be everywhere, and what the deal is
with the gluten free lifestyle? Ye, what does it have
to do with Miley Cyrus. Yeah, So basically we're going
(00:45):
to tackle Celiac disease and Miley Cyrus right to boil
it down for you. But what to kick things off
is Celiac disease exactly? Well, Kristen, it happens to be
a digestive condition triggered by eating gluten, which is a
protein found in foods containing wheat, barley, or rye. So basically,
(01:05):
people with this condition candy, bread, pasta, cookies, pizza, or
anything else that makes me happy in my life. Yeah,
I mean, there are ways which will get to where
you can eat those things. But it has to be
made with specialty kinds of ingredients that do not contain gluten.
And the reason why gluten triggers this problem with people
(01:27):
with celiac is that, um, there is an immune reaction
in the small intestine that damages hair like structures that
coat the inside of our intestines called vel i, and
those vally help the body absorb nutrients. And if the
vel i get damaged, he just poop out the nutrients.
(01:49):
Oh dear, he just poop it out. What is okay? Well,
that's good. Uh. It also causes a loss of calcium
and bone density, so that is definitely something for women
in particular to think about, lactose intolerance, cancer, and neurological complications.
So if things are upset in your tummy, if you
have a tinder tummy, you have a lot of other
things to worry about. But you might not even have
(02:11):
a tinder tummy if you do, in fact have celiac,
because it can happen without symptoms, and as the Mayo
client points out, there isn't one set of symptoms that
happens to everybody, which is why it can be kind
of hard to a diagnose among those symptoms. So that
you might get could include things like abdominal pain, diarrhea.
(02:35):
Since we've talked about the upset stomach, um irritability, or depression,
there was a new study that we found um linking
heightened depression in women with Celiac disease. They haven't looked
at it in men. It was just focused on women.
But there does seem to be that mental health aspect
of it. Muscle cramps, skin rash, mouth sores, grape poop,
(02:58):
grape poop, grape poop. That's terrifying. Yeah, a lot of
these A lot of these symptoms are malnutrition related because,
like Kristen said, when you're you're small, intestine has damaged.
When when the lining of its damage, you're not getting
those nutrients you need. So you know, you might think
that you're getting enough food, you're putting enough food in
your mouth, but you're not getting the nutrients out of it.
And so you might wonder what causes this? Why have
(03:20):
I been struck down with Celiac disease? Nobody knows. Nobody knows.
It does seem to be more common in women, according
to the National Institutes of Health. Also more common at
least used to be in non Hispanic white folk of
European ancestry, but that is also starting to change as well,
(03:46):
and as it has started to branch out among other
ethnicities and all around the world, not just in in
Europe and now in the US. The rate of Celiac
disease has gone up, according to a study those published
in July in the American Journal of gastro Entrology. Well,
at the same time that the rates are going up,
(04:09):
a lot of people do not even realize that they
have it. And from this Mayo Clinic study that was
published in August, they said that one point for million
of the estimated one point eight million Americans with Celiac
disease are unaware they have it, which is crazy because
that's a majority of the sufferers of Celiac disease. And
(04:29):
so the researchers said that the rate of the disease
in the US is one and one forty one, which
is similar to the rate in European countries. So again
there's that tie. Yeah, and um, the study also confirmed
that it's four times more common today in the US
for someone to get to celiac diagnosis than it was
(04:50):
fifty years ago. And these researchers um the study that
we're referencing is coming out of the Mayo Clinic that
was a team of gastro urologists that we're looking at
this problem and trying to puzzle out why there's been
this spike. And according to UM, what they told CBS
News about their study was that it might have to
(05:12):
do with how wheat is grown. Essentially, back in the
nineteen fifties, UH scientists started crossbreeding wheat to be heartier
and easier to produce. But those changes in how we
bread wheat may have altered the structure of gluten, making
(05:32):
it harder for some of our bodies to process. And
not to mention, we eat so much more processed food
now than we used to, but our diets have have
gotten a lot worse. Yeah, And I mean, I wonder
if that has to do with the spread of Celiac
disease across the world, the fact that they're noticing these
increased rates and other ethnicities and countries and areas of
(05:54):
the world that maybe didn't see it as often as
we are now. So maybe it's just more cheesy poofs
are moving around the globe, all those cheesy poofs. It
always goes back to the poofs um Yeah, in the
United States, just a good an idea of how quickly
this has come on our public health radar. According to
(06:14):
a New York Times magazine from two thousand ten, Celiac
disease wasn't considered a public health issue until two thousand three,
and that was largely because of the efforts of a
very small number of doctors who were looking into why
this disease hadn't translated from Europe over to the US,
(06:39):
and they realized that there was a lot of under
diagnosis that was going on. Yeah, and the doctors really
didn't think that Celiac disease was that big of a
deal that not many people had it, it was pretty contained.
But Dr Alessio Fasano of the University of Maryland found
that out of two thousand blood samples, one and two
d and fifty tested positive for the disease. He followed
(07:01):
it up with that two thousand three study, massive study
and found that out of thirteen thousand subjects, one and
a hundred and thirty three people had it, and among
the relatives of those people the rate was one in
twenty two. So obviously, if your mom, your sister, whoever
in your family has it, you have a much higher
risk of developing it. Right, and also probably because as
(07:22):
we mentioned earlier, there aren't hallmark symptoms of celiac disease,
saying you know X, Y, and Z, that means that
you have it. Um, the diagnosis might be tricky. And
the three main ways that doctors can diagnose celia diseases
through blood testing, genetic testing because of that genetic link
that you just mentioned caroline, or biopsies of the small intestine,
(07:44):
which would probably test whether or not those vl i,
those hair like structures um are intact or not. And
the vl I now, as a side note, are now
making me envisioned the inside of our small intestines as
a shag carpet. No, I'm picturing it more is like
(08:05):
those little you know, those little sea creatures that like
kind of pink and they kind of like, oh that's nice.
That's sides have been a burnt orange shag carpet, crows
or the floor of a hair salon. Um. Yeah, speaking
of these tests that Kristen was just mentioning, I'm yeah,
I'm totally glossing over that. By the way, um Quest Diagnostics,
(08:26):
a testing company told The New York Times for that
article that requests for Celiac blood test have jumped since
two thousand nine. So I feel like it's kind of
feeding into itself. The more you hear about Celiac disease,
and the more you think, well, gosh, I'm bloated, maybe
I have it. My poop's gray. So I'm not trying
to make light of Celiac disease. I just got great
(08:48):
poop on my brain. It's hard to get it off
the brain. Um. But yeah, so now more people are
are are getting tested, and and you know now that
I'm doing all this research for celia disease, of course
I think I have it. Oh No, I get tired,
I get bloated. You got the grape poops. No, I
don't have the grape poops. Um. But yeah, I can
(09:10):
see how people would think, well, I have these very
vague general symptoms, maybe I have celia casese. Maybe out
cut gluten out of my diet. Well yeah, and some
and some folks too will because of all of those
gastro intestinal symptoms, think maybe it's irritable bowe syndrome, all
sorts of things, Crown's disease. Yeah, all the stuff it
could be going on, when in fact it is the gluten.
(09:33):
And speaking of the gluten, here's here's a big problem. Well,
one of the problems with Celiac disease. Once you find
out you have it, it'sund like you can pop a
pill and your symptoms go away. So far, the closest
thing that medical researchers have found to a cure is gluten.
(09:54):
Removing gluten from your diet. Yeah, eating, I mean eating
pretty cleanly, you know, fruits, vegetables, meats, just don't get
crazy with the pizza crust. A New York Times article
talked about how expensive it can be to have Celiac
disease and have this lifestyle where you have to eat
special food because gluten free products run nearly three times
(10:17):
as expensive as regular products. But in places like Brittain
and Italy, a lot of gluten free products are at
least partially covered by insurance. If your doctors think that
all this food is causing you digestive problems if you
have Celiac disease, then you can get it kind of
covered by your insurance. Right and uh, also, the one
of the reasons why gluten free products may cost so
(10:39):
much is because in order to avoid gluten, this is
the list of stuff that you've got to cut out
in addition to just your run of the mill wheat flour. Okay,
we've got barley, bulgar, durham, farina, I don't even know
it for reina is dinnis farina. You avoid that mustache,
(10:59):
graham flower our rye rise. Yeah, no, beer, some molina
and spelt, which is a form of wheat. And speaking
of beer, a friend of mine is on the gluten
free thing. I tried one of her gluten free beers. Yeah,
I don't know. It tasted it didn't. It wasn't the same, Yeah,
(11:21):
it wasn't the same. Ever, is does she actually have
Celiac disease or gluten sensitivity. She does have a confirmed
gluten sensitivity. I'm not sure if it's full blown celiac,
but she was having a number of gastro intestinal problems
and once she eliminated the gluten, the symptoms have gotten
much better. Interesting, Yeah, but the beer has gotten worse unfortunately.
(11:45):
M Well, gluten sensitivity. Uh, it's the label for people
who stuff are bloating and other symptoms like your friend,
like your poor friend, and they seem to be helped
by avoiding gluten, but they don't actually have Celiac disease
like you said, um, but there are a lot of
people who were doing this little self diagnosedis things who
were cutting wheat and gluten out of their diets without
(12:06):
having talked to a doctor. So that mayo study that
we started earlier. Um It's co author, gastro intrologist Joseph
Murray said, there are a lot of people on a
gluten free diet and it's not clear what the medical
need for that is. It is important if someone thinks
they might have Celiac disease that they'd be tested first
(12:26):
before they go on the diet. And you know, I
mentioned sweet Little Miley Cyrus earlier. There was this whole
like firestorm on Twitter because she posted something. People thought
she was antarexic, and she posted this thing about no,
I have a wheat allergy, Um, I have celiac or
a sensitivity or whatever, and so you should try it
to She told everybody should cut gluten out of their diets.
It's like, wait, wait, you are not a physician, and
(12:49):
I think you're fourteen years old, so just real it
in there. It's a gluten free party in the USA.
It's my Miley Cyrus jokey like that I do. Yeah.
And there was also tennis sensation Novak Jakovic, who attributed
his massive winning streak that he had like a year
ago or something to his gluten free lifestyle because he
(13:13):
found out a prior year that he had celiac. So
he cut the gluten and all of a sudden he
was a powerhouse on the tennis court, which fueled kind
of like the whole Miley Cyrus gluten free party in
the USA thing. Um, this idea that uh you know, yeah,
gluten free is gonna make you look fabulous. Yeah, like
(13:34):
clear up your skin, make you run faster, make you
jump higher. It's like a pair of Nikes. Um. So
there have been a lot of market research firms that
have projected how much Americans will end up spending on
gluten free products every year. And while there is a
core group of customers that that need it for medical reasons,
a lot of people are just part of this fat diet,
(13:56):
like I want to lose weight, let's just cut out
all the gluten and I at the whole like the
whole diet about cutting carbs, and everything. Cutting out sugar
because you know that does help lower inflammation in your
digestive system. It could be beneficial. But people really think
this gluten free diet is going to help them lose
weight because maybe they feel bloated one day and they're like, oh, well,
I felt better afterwards. But there's not actually a scientific
(14:20):
basis for it. But it is definitely driving this humongous
billion dollar market for gluten free products. Yeah, we there
were a number of different um sources that we saw
estimating the worth of the gluten free industry, and it
was anywhere between three and seven billion dollars right now.
It's a lot of dollars, especially for something that really
(14:42):
hasn't been at the forefront of you know, public health
concerns for very long at all. And the thing is, too,
if you are considering, we're not We're not saying don't
don't eat you know, eat the gluten, eat the wheat everybody.
We're not saying that. But something to keep in mind
if you are looking to trim the gluten or even
(15:05):
go gluten free if a doctor has recommended it, just
remember that if you are buying gluten free versions of
pizza cookies, highly processed food. Even though the gluten is
gone there, it still might not be the healthiest substitute
for plain old pizza in normal cookies right as Elizabeth Policy,
(15:28):
the nutrition director at the DUP Diet and Fitness Center
and Durham, North Carolina, said, a gluten free brownie is
still a brownie. Still a brownie. Yeah, she says. Often
gluten free products are packed with saturated fat, cholesterol, and
sugar just to improve taste. To that, I say, have
a strawberry instead of your gluten free brownie. And Nancy Copperman,
who's the director of Public health Initiatives at a New
(15:50):
York Health System, said that gluten free food isn't necessarily
lighter in calories. And one thing too that's very important
for people going gluten free or gluten light is that
they need to make sure they're getting enough iron, calcium, zinc,
and be vitamins, because that is one thing that gluten
(16:12):
does provide is a lot of those those nutrients. So
a lot of times if you're going gluten free, you
need to be taken some supplements as well. And I
think to all of this, we say, you know, talk
to your doc or your nurse practitioner absolutely and CBS
but CBS story did point out that people who actually
if you're if you're thinking of this in terms of
(16:33):
weight loss, if you want to cut out things from
your diet to lose weight, um, people who actually do
have Celiac disease may actually gain weight on a gluten
free diet because they can finally absorb nutrients. When you
cut out the stuff that's hurting you, it lets your
body heal itself, and it restores the intestines ability to
absorb those necessary nutrients from food, and so Comperment who
(16:55):
I just mentioned does warn like Kristen said that if
you're hutting stuff out from your diet, you really have
to be careful that you're still getting the stuff you need.
So you could end up hurting yourself and putting yourself
at a health disadvantage just because you think that cutting
out X Y Z is going to make you thin.
And as far as the whole question of whether or not,
(17:16):
you know, should everybody go gluten free? Is it the
is it the best kind of lifestyle that we could have?
I think that it's it's yet another lesson in not
so much having to you know, cut out all carbs
cut out, all gluten cut out, you know this and that,
but more just a reiteration of being mindful of what
you're putting into your body and how it makes you feel.
(17:39):
Because I do notice if I get on um, if
I get really busy and I end up eating more
processed food than I normally do, it does make me
feel sluggish and blurated and and not quite myself. Yeah,
we all should aspire to eat healthy and clean and
and good, but you know, sometimes you get home at
night and you're like, I'm just gonna pop open those
(18:01):
cheesy poofs and I call it a day. I want
those poofs. But one thing, one thing Kristen touched on
that I would like to talk a little bit more
about is Celiac disease and women in particular. According to
the National Foundation for Celiac Awareness, the disease can actually
affect the reproductive system, resulting in infertility, miscarriages, still birth,
and adverse pregnancy outcomes. They said that the average age
(18:24):
of diagnosis is about forty five, but the time to
receive that diagnosis it's about ten years. So that means
that the entire span of the reproductive cycle may have
been interrupted if you've been having fertility problems this entire time.
I'm not saying I'm not saying that you do, but
I'm just saying, like, it is kind of scary to
think that you're small intestine, what you think is just
(18:45):
a little stomach problem could actually be interfering with your
ability to get pregnant. And they did point out that
women in the general population are diagnosed with Celiac disease
two to three times more often than men, and studies
indicate that celia disease may occur and as many as
four to eight per of women with unexplained infertility, So
there's there. There is a definite link there. Yeah. And
(19:08):
one thing that we didn't mention as well is that
childhood rates of Celiac disease are also up. I think
among the adult population four times more common than it
used to be fifty years ago, among the uh adolescent
population five times more common. So I gotta watch out
what we're eating and what those little kiddos are eating too. Yeah,
(19:30):
and please go to your doctor if you think that
you're sick. Don't don't just take our word for it
that if you're bloated, you have Celiac disease. Never take
our word for anything, obviously, we don't want to get
in trouble. That's all this is about. Uh So yeah, um,
Celiac disease, gluten free diet, Let us know your thoughts
about all of it. Mom Stuff at Discovery dot com
(19:52):
is where you can send your letter, especially for people
who have gone gluten free and felt some kind of
effects that be care used to know what what that
experience has been like. And also people with because glue,
going gluten free can be expensive and also difficult to
cook with. Anyone who has good resources for gluten free
(20:14):
recipes let us know so we can share them with everybody.
Mom stuff at Discovery dot com or head over to
the Facebook so you can instantly share it with all
of our listeners. In the meantime, we've got a couple
of letters here to share with you. This email is
from Kirsten about our Jockstraps episode because people cannot get
(20:36):
enough of it. Uh She said, I played field hockey
as a goalkeeper from middle school through the Division one
level in college, and almost every goalkeeper I knew or
met in the nine years that I played were a
pelvic protector. It looks similar to a male jock strap
with a wide waist band and straps that go around
your legs, but has a hard, triangular shaped front piece
that protects the lady parts. It was a standard issued
(20:58):
piece of equipment even when I began playing in school. Yes,
it was uncomfortable at first, but after you took one
hard shot directly to that region, you were forever thankful
to be wearing it. Sometimes shots would come at you
too quickly or at a strange angle, and you simply
didn't have time to react quickly enough. I've been hit
in that area several times, and especially when it happened
in college, I was incredibly happy she put that in
(21:18):
all caps, that I was wearing the pelvic protector. I
was always really embarrassed to wear it when I was younger,
but eventually learned to become proud of it. After all,
the alternative was getting a bruised pelvis and risking damage
to the reproductive organs. As a young player, we were
always worn that forgetting to or not wearing a pelvic
protector was risking our ability to have kids in the
future if we so chose. As a young player, we
were always worn that forgetting to or not wearing a
(21:40):
pelvic protector was risking our ability to have kids in
the future. So thanks Kristen Well. I have an email
here from Amanda and this is in reference to our
show way back When in two thousand nine on women
in the Military. And Amanda has been in the military
um since she was eighteen and listening in the Marine
(22:04):
Corps and she's now an Army National Guard soldier. She
returned from Iraq in December two thousand eleven and is
awaiting deployment to Afghanistan. Uh So, she writes, while on
the Marine Corps, my options and occupation were very limited
and left little room for advancement. The Marine Corps prides
(22:24):
themselves on being the few, while female Marine Corps are
the few among the few. The mantra of every marine
rifleman is true. When it comes to our social roles.
We are still restricted to the confines of being the
lesser Marine, since we are not allowed to perform or
assists in combat arms. After completing my obligatory contract with
(22:46):
that service, a transition to the Army National Guard. So
moving forward in her letter to when she goes to Iraq,
she writes, our Army National Guard Company escorted commodity trucks
in mind resistant ambush protected vehicles throughout the country and
out of the country, successfully closing out the American military
presence within those borders. During this operation, four of the
(23:10):
ten females myself included were gunners on multiple missions, handling
machine guns, M fours, flares, and an assortment of other
protective weapons ensuring the safety of the convoy. The male
soldiers of the cia V company became our family, many
like brothers and a few like fathers. There were no
instances of sexual harassment or demeaning overtures within the company.
(23:31):
I can honestly say that of the one thirty one
soldiers I served with in this company, not one would
allow for any treatment subpar par or not in good
standing with blood ties. But that said, I'm proud to
serve my country and humbled by the incredible dedication and
courage I have seen in my federal fellow battle buddies,
male and female, in all uniform branches. As a sergeant,
(23:53):
I have seen seventeen year old boys and girls turned
into strong American men and women, and I am grateful
every day for the heart of those who choose to
serve so thanks everyone who's written in mom Stuff at
Discovery dot Com is where you can send your letters,
or you can find us on Facebook or follow us
on Twitter at Mom's Stuff Podcast, and of course you
can find out what we're doing during the week over
(24:15):
at our website. It's how stuff works dot com for
more on this and thousands of other topics. Is it
how stuff works dot com brought to you by the
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