Small Amounts of Gluten in Subjects with Suspected Nonceliac Gluten Sensitivity
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
I had pretty bad intestinal problems for a couple of years. I had effectively ruled out gluten as a possible cause because in uni I had pizza boxes stacked to the roof.
Whilst reading a paper on a dietary study I remembered that croissants triggered severe intestinal issues for me. I began to wonder whether I had developed a sensitivity to gluten.
I cut gluten and my pretty bad intestinal issues ceased within days, with a total abatement after 2 weeks. That's been the case for 2 months now.
I also suffer from occasional (controlled) panic attacks. There has been at least a 50-75% reduction in those. (I was aware my panic attacks were exacerbated by the intestinal issues.)
Another interesting discovery in an article I read on HN is that metabolism is more affected by eating than light. So I tried not eating any calories after 10pm.
My normal waking hour is 11 am and has been for 15 years. By the first weekend after I started nil calories after 10 pm, I woke up at 7:30 am! (It's stablised to a more civilised hour now.)
Another really strange effect is that since stopping with gluten I have had very vivid childhood memories. I don't believe I had "brain fog", but something interesting happened.
I wonder if as we age, certain groups of people experience a failure of digestive enzymes across a variety of biological compounds.
Another odd one I discovered is jerky video playback (e.g. streaming on the web). That triggers a sense of unreality which can trigger an attack.
Are these P numbers actually a large effect, though? This doesn't seem to have freely available full text.
I'm interested in how large an effect "significantly increased" means. I suspect that this is defined a little more rigorously in the actual text, but it doesn't seem to be in the abstract.
Even if you ignore all the messiness of actually existing scientific practice, the math alone doesn't quite say that. It depends on your prior[0] and the power[1] of the study.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes'_theorem [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistical_power
I'd love for this to be performed on a larger scale, we'll prove that either gluten sensitivity exists or psychics do if the results hold.
Canyon Bakehouse - http://canyonglutenfree.com/
I've successfully made multiple loaves (and styles) of bread with this stuff, along with tortillas and amazingly (to me) an Angel Food cake from scratch. It's all turned out reasonably well the first time, and excellent the second time after I've had a chance to tweak things a little bit.
I would recommend using it in "scientist mode" though. I use a kitchen scale and measure the mass of all of the ingredients I use, along with taking notes about mixing times and things like that when I'm using it. Mostly because: a) I don't cook gluten-free very often, so I want repeatable results, and b) I really like to be able to figure out what went wrong.
What's unfortunate is your dismissal of (scare-quoted!) gluten free food as a health fad, but so it goes.
I'm dismissing things like Gluten-free corn dogs... why the hell gluten is in a corn dog is the first place is another problem all by itself.
https://jonrappoport.wordpress.com/2014/02/24/email-from-aut...
Unfortunately I don't read enough scientific journals to vouch for the veracity of it.
The reddit thread[0] on this paper has a lot of nonsense, but also has people with actual access to the paper. One informative comment (keeping in mind this study was done only on people who already identified as gluten sensitive):
> 31 of the individuals had an equal response to gluten or placebo, a further 13 had no significant difference. 5 individuals had stronger negative effects to placebo, 9 had stronger effects to Gluten. The three mentioned were over 2 standard deviations above the mean, and hence considered to be sensitive.
> There did appear to be a general increase across the board for symptoms, however the one caveat that was reported in results, but not discussed was the fact that individuals report worse symptoms (p=0.009) in the first week of the trial compared to the second.
> There were also no individual symptoms that showed a significant difference between the placebo and gluten. Only when all symptoms were combined as a sum did they have a difference.
[0] https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/2x844y/randomized_...
Is that saying of 58 people studied, if 2 more people had stronger negative effects to placebo than Gluten then there'd be no discernible difference between placebo and Gluten?
How does that show a significant correlation?
I did register as highly sensitive to gluten (and dairy and soy) on an IgG test. That's not celiac though. Also, as these things seem to be correlated, I am homozygous for MTHFR 677T mutation.
There is this strange myth that exists in nutrition that food is somehow "designed" for the human body and that there are absolute answers as to what is good for you and what is bad for you.
The gluten-free movement of sorts is just another step in a long running misunderstanding of how food is processed by the human body. The result of which is always, "<food> is not good for you, this study proves it!" The reality is much more personal.
It's possible that the rise in gluten sensitivity has more to do with changing gut flora than anything else. That may be a result of long term gluten consumption, too much gluten consumption or something else completely unrelated.
I wouldn't say that I noticed a lessening of symptoms when we switched to gluten free diet BUT I did recently buy a bread machine and started making gluten based bread regularly (and eating a lot of it). Symptom wise I have felt much worse than ever before... no idea if there's a link... but it was interesting to note (had to rack my brain to figure out why I felt so bloated and crummy). Only real change was the consumption of more bread than usual.
"Fodmaps is an acronym for fermentable oligosaccharides, disaccharides, monosaccharides and polyols, sugars that draw water into the intestinal tract. They may be poorly digested or absorbed, and become fodder for colonic bacteria that produce gas and can cause abdominal distress."
http://www.gastrojournal.org/article/S0016-5085%2813%2900702...
The only problem is the it is really hard to find FODMAP food in grocery stores. You end up eating a very small group of the same meals and are forced to not eat out at many restaurants. So much like weight-loss/working out you'll be receding back to eating regular food within a few months unless you're dedicated.
I hope the 'food industry' starts offering more food in the FODMAP genre, instead of the obsessive and over-priced gluten-free products that are popping up - and largely not science based the way FODMAP has been.
My mother is so allergic to wheat (not sure if it's the gluten or not) that when she touches dough, she instantly breaks out in hives at the site of contact. It's interesting, because ingestion isn't required to produce a reaction. She can't eat the stuff, either.
She's even more allergic to corn. The only grain she can contact without consequence is rice. She eliminated grains from her diet and, after many years, can now eat small amounts without much of a problem.
Can anyone else here attest to this kind of general grain allergy?
When talking about gut sensitivity I think people are usually referring to the IgG sensitivity.
She can't even consume meat from animals that were fed corn. Thankfully grass-fed beef is becoming more common, but chicken and pork are generally off limits.
Does anybody here has empirical experience with ADHD and the supposed connection with gluten sensitivity [1] ? I have a kid with severe ADHD and I have been always reluctant to try a gluten-free diet, but the truth is that the evidence is getting stronger everyday.
Thanks.
Incidentally, I did the 23andme test and I have just checked mine[1]:
A1298C: no SNP of MTHFR
C677T: heterozygous for MTHFR
[1] http://blog.stickyrice.net/archives/2013/decode-23andme-for-...
My son - as many ADHD kids due to their lack of impulse control - had an extremely sweet tooth and it was just impossible to stick with the diet. Now, 3 years later, I have slowly managed to reduce his cravings and we could give it another try. thanks.
I went gluten-free "hardcore" for 2 years and now I supplement with probiotics and can eat gluten on occasion. I feel much better with gluten out of my diet, but by no means is it a "cure" for ADHD, and I still use my ADHD medication (methylphenidate in my case) even when I'm 100% gluten-free.
I would definitely try gluten-free with your child, but don't mistake it for a holy grail of eliminating all symptoms. Rather, it will probably help your child focus better and feel better in general (it is hard to concentrate when your stomach is killing you.)
Feel free to email me if you'd like to speak more; I've been public about my diagnosis with both of these.
I don't expect a miracle here, but everything counts. In this direction, Omega-3 supplementation was great to reduce the "hyper" side of his ADHD. Sadly, it did nothing for his focus.
He is also on methylphenidate (20mg). It is working well for him.
One thing that's not clear is what was communicated to the patients: "You'll be given gluten", "You'll be given something unspecified" or "You'll be given a gluten-free food" (and then groups split in gluten/placebo given)
The question is "What did they think they have?"
The important part of the title is the words Double-Blind. The patients don't know and the people running it don't know.
I guess the assumption is that since both groups receive the same information any placebo effect would be equalized.
I'm asking what they are told, of course in a double-blind study they are never told if they're given the drug or the placebo, but they tell the people "this is an experimental drug for X"
But they might have told them "This is a treatment for gluten intolerance" or "this is purified gluten" or nothing