Avoiding gluten can be challenging. Many prepared foods contain gluten as a hidden ingredient. That is why there has been an explosion in gluten-free foods in supermarkets.
But can you trust the gluten-free label on bread, pasta or cookies? Since the definition of gluten-free has been somewhat ambiguous, some manufacturers have claimed that their foods are free of gluten when they really aren’t.
That is why the FDA has just issued guidelines that define gluten-free foods as having less than 20 parts per million of gluten. The FDA has given food companies one year to comply with this voluntary guideline, so people with celiac disease will still need to be very careful in their food selection process.
Here is one reader’s story about a difficult diagnostic journey:
“I have been diagnosed with celiac disease since the 40s when I was under 3. Eventually I went into remission and could tolerate some gluten, but I was always ill with all kinds of stomach pains. By the late 80s I was at the end stage, and had to stay home. This happened after seeing some 20 gastroenterologists who thought I had IBS or some other stomach diseases. One doctor suggested I was missing an enzyme. I refused to go to the ER because I felt they new nothing about the disease. I honestly believe that by going I would only become more ill.
“Luckily for me, a doctor from Italy had come to my city and the doctor’s nurse called me because as yet he had no patients. He told me what I had was the same celiac disease that was present when I was a toddler. He told me to stay away from gluten, which I have done all these years. I felt much better 24 hours after seeing him. I told every physician I saw prior to the one who diagnosed me that I had celiac as a child. None saw this as a clue.
“I go to a self help group where I live that I started ten years ago. The members know a great deal. The Celiac Sprue Association as well as others have all the information about gluten free foods.”
