I know that in celiac disease, the villi in the intestines can get damaged, and even destroyed.

What I'm wondering is if 'gluten intolerance' can also damage the villi in the intestines? And is there even a difference between gluten intolerance and celiac?

I feel like that commercial on TV years ago, "I can't see a difference, can you see a difference?" (forget what it was advertising).

Is there a difference? Just curious what everyone in here thinks - very wise people here, with a wealth of knowledge.

Thanks

Celiac disease refers to the autoimmune destruction of the small intestine lining caused by ingested glutenous grains .......wheat, barley, rye, and oats.

Gluten intolerance refers to an autoimmune attack, anywhere in the body, caused by ingested glutenous grains. So celiac disease is a subset of gluten intolerance.

A third important wheat disease term is rapidly gaining prominence, gluten sensitivity. Gluten sensitivity refers to the set of diseases, autoimmune or directly pathogenic, which occur because a person ingests glutenous grains. So gluten sensitivity includes both subsets above.

Besides the above, gluten sensitive diseases include gluten attacking tissue without an immune response, and diseases from antigens which gluten ushers into the bloodstream. The antigens can destroy tissue directly, or illicit an immune response which destroys tissue.

Confused? Track the wheat and the immune reactions. The immune system can be divided into the innate response and the adaptive response. The innate system attacks antigens and compromised tissue based on its memory of antigen protein signatures. The adaptive system identifies new antigens, tests methods of response, and commits the successful methods to innate memory.

When a celiac eats wheat, his/her digestive immune system attacks the wheat and the small intestine lining. Then a strange thing happens among gluten sensitive people. The small intestine, through innate memory, releases the cytokine zonulin. Zonulin opens the "tight junctions" between cells in the intestinal lining. The lining becomes permeable, and passes the intestine's contents into the bloodstream.

Those contents include gluten, other proteins, viruses and bacteria. They attack tissue, and elicit immune responses which attack tissue, throughout the body.

^^Oats aren't glutenous, fyi. You have to look for oats labeled "gluten-free" to avoid cross, contamination, though.

I'll remember that next time I get gluten-sick from ingesting oats.

Rye and Barley have no gluten either. They have proteins which are extremely similar to gluten, and cause the same effects.

Avenin is the protein in oats. It has parts similar to gluten. Avenin has tested both positive and negative for celiac effects. Science is just now testing gluten for gluten sensitivity effects.

Actually I've worked with wheat and oats in the grain belt. None of the augers, hoppers, trucks, combines or silos are dedicated to a single type of grain. They aren't even kinda cleaned between loads of different grains. Residual grain can be measured in tens of bushels in any of these containers.

Gluten sensitive people may eat oats at their own risk, but not on my advice.

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You are correct about the type of protein in oats possibly causing issues for people with gluten issues.
However, only a portion of people it effects. Similar to how some people who cannot ingest gluten also cannot have dairy products without concern, but many others can.


Luckily I can have oats without any problem if I buy the sort that are certified to be safe for celiacs (which I am). I buy the brand "only oats".

Thank you very much!

This clears up a lot of things that were confusing me, and I really appreciate your reply here.

I was asking for a few of reasons - first, I'm pretty new at this whole gluten sensitivity thing. Second, I had this longstanding dairy intolerance of some kind, so I quit dairy about a year and a half ago.

Turns out I don't have an issue with casein, (according to Enterolab) so now am wondering about this 'dairy intolerance'. I guess I'm wondering if one has a 'lactose intolerance' caused by a gluten problem - then does this mean it must be of the celiac variety? I suppose too though that one can be lactose intolerant for any particular reason, at any time.

It's just curiosity on my part - I don't eat dairy or gluten anymore anyway...just trying to make sense of things in my own mind, re: dairy intolerance and how it relates to gluten.

Meanwhile, since I ditched gluten - my husband has also gone gluten-free. He doesn't have any of the usual intestinal symptoms. None. But he does have this 'wheat belly' (as he calls it, since he saw that term used on Dr. Davis' Heart Scan blog) and tells me he's had that his whole life. Even at 150lbs, he's had that belly he says. But guess what's happening as a result of my husband going gluten free? His longstanding arthritis is actually getting even better. The thing that confuses me is that he was diagnosed with osteoarthritis (a long time ago), which as far as I know isn't an autoimmune type of arthritis.

You've helped me see that it's not always an 'immune response', and that the only thing that separates 'celiac' from the whole spectrum of gluten sensitivity or intolerance is the fact that it attacks the small intestine lining. And yet, you've also explained that even if not celiac - a gluten sensitive person could end up with that 'leaky gut' thing.

Thanks again.

From here on we're dealing a lot with experiment-backed opinion. Lactose is a complex sugar. Cells can only use simple sugars. Lactose is separated into simple sugars in the small intestine by the enzyme lactase. The mechanism for detecting lactose and triggering lactase is contained in the villi. The same scenario exists for other complex sugars like fructose .........in most fruits and constitutes 50% of sucrose.

Digestion of complex sugars requires functioning villi. Non-controlled celiacs don't have functioning villi.

"Leaky gut" can be caused by candida albicans fungus. Candida thrives on intestinal sugar. Candida presents a protein which is immune identical to gluten. It's theorized that the zonulin response is first established as an immune response to digestive candida. The response is committed to innate memory.

Thereafter, whenever a gluten sensitive person consumes gluten, the small intestine dumps its contents into the bloodstream. The zonulin response may or may not control the candida. There may or may not be an ongoing immune reaction to gluten.

No tests I'm aware of have shown other antigens to elicit a zonulin dump. Casein damage from the bloodstream, both direct and immune, has been indicted along with gluten. But in the absence of any other evidence both antigens are placed into the bloodstream because of the ingestion of gluten.

Casein has been associated with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). In my readings I can't tell any practical causative difference between RA and osteoarthritis. They appear to be different manifestations of the same disease. RA has been associated with an immune response to casein. The blood's immune system mistakes cartilage for casein, and attacks it. There's good anecdotal evidence that abstaining from gluten keeps undigested casein out of the bloodstream, and cures arthritis.

..........and everybody thinks arthritis is a manifestation of the metabolic syndrome.

In my opinion the rest of the metabolic syndrome is also caused by gluten ingestion .......the product of molecular mimicry and a broken pancreatic fight-or-flight response.

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Gluten intolerance is kind of blanket term that covers celiac disease and problems with gluten that don't affect the villi. There's also a skin disorder and it doesn't affect the villi at all.

A few doctors are starting to acknowledge there is something to non-celiac gluten intolerance, but it's slow to catch on.

I should mention that NSAIDS, like aspirin and ibuprofen, also cause intestinal permeability:

http://www.pulsus.com/journals/abst...HCtype=Consumer

http://www.ei-resource.org/research...uring-exercise/

http://tpx.sagepub.com/cgi/content/full/34/2/168


It's easy for gluten sensitive people like us to slip into a host-induced NSAIDS cycle. NSAIDS place antigens into the bloodstream which cause symptoms which we respond to with more NSAIDS .......which cause more symptoms .......which.......

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Oats also contain avenin which a lot of celiacs also are sensitive to, and huge cross contamination issues.

I'm definitely going to be printing this thread off. Thank you so much!

I can tell this is going to be a real learning curve for me. I haven't tried testing out my 'dairy intolerance', and am not sure if I ever want to.

Somehow, the few times I've had really bad dairy reactions - coincided with also eating gluten. I didn't realize it at first, but hindsight is 20/20. I was wondering why my dairy intolerance seemed to be getting worse and worse. Now I think it was gluten all along. Horrible reaction to blue cheese...and later on, I find out that blue cheese is made with mouldy bread. Decided to 'cheat' (or 'carb up' if you want to gloss it over)...had a cheese quesadilla. Another particularly bad reaction. And, of course - I blamed the cheese. Didn't even think about the tortilla.

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I do find it fascinating what you're saying about RA vs. osteoarthritis. And that there's 'good anecdotal evidence' that abstaining from gluten keeps the casein out of the bloodstream and somehow cures arthritis.

When I mentioned to my husband that you'd said you couldn't find anything showing a causative difference between RA and OA - he said to me, "That's because they don't know what causes it" (arthritis in general).

I'm really starting to think gluten's really bad for us, and dairy's a close second.

I found this to be particularly helpful and enlightening - you were saying:



No gluten for me, and I'm not in any hurry at all to try out dairy.

That said, I kinda miss butter...but have no interest in gluten-y things. Don't care about cheese at all. Never really liked it much anyway. (yeah, I know...weird).

I used to think "Paleo" was way too difficult, and it's somehow turning out to be my best way of eating. Funny how things turn out. I'm not sure I'm all that "Paleo" in my eating, but suffice to say - there's no gluten, no dairy, no sugar, no soy, no legumes, no artificial sweetener - and for the moment, no eggs either (another round of 'no sensitive seven foods' for me). Fun and games.

In any case - thanks again, you've helped a lot. Much appreciated.

Hmm - I'm not one for taking much in the way of medicine (only because I haven't really needed it) but my husband does take NSAIDS from time to time to deal with arthritis pain. He doesn't seem to have any kind of intestinal issues, but does deal with arthritis - and the arthritis seems to be linked with his food choices. I'm pretty convinced there's a link between his diet and his arthritis, and he is too. It's a bit of that 'needle in a haystack' kind of thing though - slowly, but surely - we're finding out what foods help and what foods aren't so great.

I'm glad you mentioned this (about the NSAIDS) - I'll have to take a good look at those links tomorrow.

Definitely food for thought - didn't realize that NSAIDS and/or aspirin would be implicated in a catch-22 type of scenario with regards to intestinal permeability...take it for pain, create more pain, take more medicine...yadda yadda yadda.

When my tummy acts up, I drink peppermint tea. It helps a wee bit. Quells nausea and soothes overall. It doesn't make everything go away, but it truly does help.

Ok - now I'm wondering about something else. I've read that glutamine was useful for 'leaky gut' sort of stuff, and yet - the one time I tried it, I found that it seemed to exacerbate things, in terms of overall stomach pain. Read somewhere that glutamine was quite similar to MSG, and not necessarily a great idea for those with gluten sensitivity - because these types of proteins are also similar to gluten. I don't have a link to anything, but I do seem to remember reading there's a possibility that: glutamine = similar to MSG = similar to gluten.

Anyone else come across this theory?

Ok - time for bed...

(note to self: problem with lactose could also mean a problem with fructose).

Thank you for that bit too. Very helpful.

Thanks Nancy - this helps a lot too. I couldn't quite figure out if there was a difference between gluten intolerance and celiac.

Makes me want to say 'the villi aren't the only thing' or something along those lines.

Thanks for this info. It explains two times when I was glutened by restaurant salad dressing. I figured the restaurants were cutting their blue cheese dressing with flour. .....not so.

I'll remember this.




I don't see much reason to abstain from eating butter, especially on a gluten-free diet. Butter's lactose and casein content is very low.

Cow-milk cheeses are iffy. Cheeses have low lactose and casein contents compared to milk .......on the scale of 5% as much. The fermenting bacteria mostly pre-digest the sugar and protein .......gross but tasty. I eat them, but I have to be careful. Mostly I use exercise to clear the cheese headaches. I'm not sure how that works, but I suspect exercise uses ketosis to convert systemic lactose to lactic acid .......a byproduct of exertion. The liver and kidneys are capable of clearing lactic acid.




Be careful with peppermint. It can induce heart arrhythmia.

My systemic autoimmune response to gluten is hypothyroidism .......Graves disease, and accompanying heart arrhythmia. I discovered the hard way that the peppermint tea I was drinking was making me a nearly-unconscious floor decoration.

Spearmint has much less of the offending chemical. But be aware.

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I've never heard that rye and barley don't have gluten per se. Regardless, I react to them.

One problem with gluten and casein is that once they get into the bloodstream they can form opioid peptides, and cause both autistic and schizophrenic symptoms when they reach the brain. This also happens when rye is infected with the ergot fungus. LSD was originally made from rye.

I think I have gluten ataxia, which makes me clumsy when I eat gluten (I was awkward and uncoordinated all my life until I gave up gluten). Gluten ataxia can lead to blindness.


Some casein-intolerant people can eat ghee, which is said to have no casein at all - but not everyone can tolerate it. I'm doing all right with it, but I've gotten to like lard quite a lot and I wouldn't miss ghee too much as long as I had lard.


Actually, I thought cheese had quite a high casein content, although some of it was hydrolysed.

It used to seem gross to me, but I've come to accept fermenting bacteria as my friends, and it doesn't even bother me to think about how fish sauce is made anymore...!