Study Reveals No Association Between Celiac Disease and Autism

A latest finding disproves previous theories that draw an association between celiac disease (gluten intolerance) and increased risk of autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

 The Swedish study led by researchers at Karolinska Institutet discovered that there was no association between the two disorders. The study was conducted on 26,995 people who suffered from celiac disease (CD), 3,719 people who were tested positive for CD but had no usual symptoms and 12,304 people who had inflammation of the small intestines.

The 'autoimmune' disorder of the small intestine is referred to as celiac disease and it causes symptoms like pain and discomfort in the digestive tract, constipation and diarrhoea, fatigue and anemia. People with celiac disease often have vitamin deficiency.  This digestive disorder occurs on exposure to a substance called gluten that damages the absorptive surface of the small intestine. It affects people of all ages.

The study revealed that those diagnosed with ASD didn't have a higher risk of CD. However on being diagnosed with ASD, people had an elevated risk of having a normal mucosa (moist tissue that line certain parts of the inside body) but a positive antibody test commonly seen with CD.

"This is good news for patients with celiac disease," lead author Jonas F. Ludvigsson, MD, PhD, professor of clinical epidemiology at the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, told Medscape Medical News."Celiac disease occurs in about 1 percent of the U.S. population, and these patients were at no increased risk of autism."

What continues to remain a mystery is the mechanism of this relation with positive CD antibody. The researchers predict that the increased mucosal permeability in these CD leads to such an association.

"Our data are consistent with earlier research in that we found no convincing evidence that CD is associated with ASD except for a small excess risk noted after CD diagnosis. We can't rule out the fact that children with ASD are investigated for CD more often than others, which could explain these results", concludes study author Jonas Ludvigsson, a Professor at Karolinska Institutet.