Gluten-Linked Disease More Common Than Thought

CHICAGO -- A study finds that more than 1.5 million Americans get digestive problems from gluten in wheat and other grains, a condition called celiac disease.

That's more people with the potentially deadly disease than had been thought.

University of Maryland researchers tested more than 13,000 people from 32 states, including nearly 9,000 who were considered at risk for celiac disease because of symptoms or family history.

The disease was present in one in 22 people with a close relative with celiac disease and in one in 133 participants who weren't at risk.

"We now believe that more than 1.5 million Americans suffer from celiac disease, making it twice as common as Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis and cystic fibrosis combined," said lead researcher Dr. Alessio Fasano, professor of pediatrics, medicine and physiology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.

The study is published in Monday's issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Previous research suggested the disease occurred in about one in 4,000 Americans, although large-scale screening studies in Europe revealed that celiac disease is one of the most common genetic diseases in the world, occurring in from 1 in 130 people to 1 in 300 people in the European general population.

Celiac disease is an autoimmune disease, just like diabetes and rheumatoid arthritis, Fasano said.

"There are two elements that play together for someone to develop an autoimmune disease. You must have a genetic predisposition and there must be some environmental factor to trigger the disease," he said. "Celiac disease is the only autoimmune disease where that trigger is known. That trigger is gluten."

Fasano said this study may pave the way for researchers to uncover the causes of other autoimmune diseases.