Celiac mortality

July 15, 2003

Since we get on this thread a bit ;-)

This kind of study means two things:

1. If you have celiac (and by extrapolation, any gluten intolerance) then you

need to be careful.

2. You can bet the medical insurance people won't like a celiac official

diagnosis.

Results A total of 828 patients with celiac disease died during the follow-up

period (1965-1994). For all causes of death combined, mortality risks were

significantly elevated: 2.0-fold (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.8-2.1) among

all patients with celiac disease and 1.4-fold (95% CI, 1.2-1.6) among patients

with celiac disease with no other discharge diagnoses at initial

hospitalization. The overall SMR did not differ by sex or calendar year of

initial hospitalization, whereas mortality risk in patients hospitalized with

celiac disease before the age of 2 years was significantly lower by 60% (95% CI,

0.2-0.8) compared with the same age group of the general population. Mortality

risks were elevated for a wide array of diseases, including non-Hodgkin lymphoma

(SMR, 11.4), cancer of the small intestine (SMR, 17.3), autoimmune diseases

(including rheumatoid arthritis [sMR, 7.3] and diffuse diseases of connective

tissue [sMR, 17.0]), allergic disorders (such as asthma [sMR, 2.8]),

inflammatory bowel diseases (including ulcerative colitis and Crohn disease

[sMR, 70.9]), diabetes mellitus (SMR, 3.0), disorders of immune deficiency (SMR,

20.9), tuberculosis (SMR, 5.9), pneumonia (SMR, 2.9), and nephritis (SMR, 5.4).

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