Coping with either one of these diseases on their own is difficult for most. But for those with diabetes and celiac disease, things get a little more complicated. Most people are at least familiar with diabetes, but many have not even heard of celiac disease. Let’s take a brief look at what celiac disease is, what the relationship between diabetes and celiac disease might be, and how a patient might approach managing both diabetes and celiac disease while living a normal life.
What is Celiac Disease?
Celiac disease is a condition that does damage to the small intestine. This damage prevents the small intestine from absorbing the healthy components of food eaten. The damage is a result of ingesting gluten, which for unknown reasons causes damage to the nutrient absorbing villi that is found in the lining of the small intestine. Like diabetes, celiac disease is an immune system problem. So a person with celiac disease cannot tolerate gluten. With celiac disease the gluten triggers an immune response that attacks and damages the villi in the small intestine. The result is that a person can become malnourished no matter how much they eat. Among other conditions, for people with celiac disease, diabetes is one of the diseases that are more likely to develop in celiac patients.
Celiac Disease and Diabetes Together – How to Cope.
Type 1 diabetes and celiac disease often occur together. In fact the rate of celiac disease in type 1 diabetes patients is between 10 and 20 percent. This is compared to the rate of celiac disease in the general population of about 1 percent.
Both diabetes and celiac disease are autoimmune disorders and it is becoming clearer to researchers that there is probably genetic links between the two. The link is so strong between diabetes and celiac disease that doctors now recommend that anyone diagnosed with type 1 diabetes should also be tested for celiac disease. The good news ids that while type 1 diabetes doesn’t go away for the majority of patients, celiac disease can be controlled and actually eliminated after a couple years by eating a gluten free diet.
When you have both diabetes and celiac disease, you not only have to maintain strict blood sugar control, but have to eliminate gluten from the diet. For the new patient, a dietician or other expert is worth consulting to make sure you are still getting proper nutrition. At first, the diet will be difficult, because when the gluten is eliminated, the small intestine begins to heal and absorb more food nutrients, but also more sugar and starches. But it is unpredictable until things level off.
With improvement of the celiac disease the need for more insulin increases because of increased sugar absorption. The balance gets tricky and frequent blood glucose self-testing is needed. A1c levels will probably get worse at first – but stick to it!
The other problem for those with diabetes and celiac disease is that the healing of the celiac disease usually means weight gain, again because of increased nutrient absorption. For diabetics, weight gain is not a good thing.
But with patience and some experimenting, you will get it right, and be able to live a normal life as long as you watch your diet. A gluten-free diet in the long run is good for both diabetes and celiac disease. In the beginning, because of the unpredictability of the results of the gluten-free diet, you should always have a gluten free snack with you in case your blood sugar drops unexpectedly.
