Q&A on celiac disease, gluten-free diet

Dr. Stephen WangenWe at Custom Choice Cereal are happy to offer you another Q&A session on celiac disease, gluten intolerance, and living gluten-free or wheat-free with a renown expert in the field, Dr. Stephen Wangen.

Suffering from celiac disease himself, Stephen has devoted his life to educating and providing help to people effected with digestive issues of various kinds. You can read about The Gluten Free Doctor’s impressive credentials on our page about our advisors.

The whole thing is pretty simple and works in 4 easy steps:

1. Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
2. We send all questions to Dr. Wangen
3. Dr. Wangen’s answers will be published in reply to your comments
4. Key: First come – first serve. 5 question limit per session

This great service could not be provided to you without Dr. Wangen’s goodwill. We at Custom Choice Cereal are very thankful that Stephen continues to offer these monthly Q&A session on our blog. At the same time, we’d like to thank you for understanding that out of respect for Dr. Wangen and his time we have to limit each session to 5 questions.

Celiac & gluten-free Q&A for you

Dr. Stephen WangenWe at Custom Choice Cereal receive plenty of questions about celiac disease, gluten intolerance, and the gluten-free or wheat-free diets. Unfortunately, we are not qualified to give medical advice. That’s why we are super-excited to offer you another Q&A session with celiac expert Dr. Stephen Wangen. You can see The Gluten Free Doctor’s impressive credentials by visiting the page with our advisors.

Here is how it works, just follow these simple steps and you’re fine:

1. Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
2. We send all questions to Dr. Wangen
3. Dr. Wangen’s answers will be published in reply to your comments
4. Key: First come – first serve. 5 question limit per session

The Custom Choice Cereal team is very happy that Dr. Stephen Wangen agrees to provide this great service to you. Thank you for understanding that out of respect for Stephen we have to limit each session to 5 questions!

Gluten-free expert Dr. Wangen answers

Dr. Stephen WangenCustom Choice Cereal is proud to be able to present yet another Q&A session with celiac and gluten-free expert Dr. Stephen Wangen as a service to you. Dr. Wangen, also known as The Gluten Free Doctor, is co-founder of the IBS Treatment Center in Seattle and serves on the Board of Trustees for the Gluten Intolerance Group of North America. More credentials for Dr. Wangen can be found in our section with useful gluten-free links.

Now let’s focus on the essentials and give you the instructions how this whole Q&A-thing works:

  1. Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
  2. We send your question to Dr. Wangen
  3. Dr. Wangen’s answers will be published in reply to your comments
  4. Key: First come – first serve.  5 question limit per session

Custom Choice Cereal is very thankful that Dr. Wangen agreed to provide this outstanding service to you. Please respect that he is a busy man and can only answer 5 questions per session. Thank you for your understanding!

Celiac disease and Alzheimer's linked?

We at Custom Choice Cereal consider ourselves very fortunate to be able to offer monthly Q&A sessions with renown celiac expert Dr. Stephen Wangen. This is not only a great service for you but also teaches us things about the gluten-free diet and celiac disease that we did not know about.

Someone asked whether there was a connection between eating wheat and Alzheimer’s. Dr. Wangen assumed that no connection had been found because no one had looked for one. He decided to dig further and found the following from a 2008 article published in the Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology:

“Two female patients presented with cognitive decline that was attributed to Alzheimer dementia but ameliorated after the initiation of gluten-free diet. The third patient had peripheral neuropathy that completely resolved after the initiation of gluten-free diet.”
Lurie, et. al, “Celiac Disease Diagnosed in the Elderly,” Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology, Jan 2008, Vol. 42(1):59-61.

Science DailyCustom Choice Cereal did some digging as well and found that researches at the Mayo Clinic investigated the connection between celiac disease and Alzheimer’s in a 2006 study. Science Daily reported that they analyzed a case series of 13 patients demonstrating cognitive decline within two years of the onset of celiac disease symptom onset or worsening. At that time, Dr. Joseph Murray (who explains celiac disease in several videos on our website) suspected the following theories to explain the connection between celiac disease and cognitive decline:

  • Nutritional deficiency
  • Inflammatory cytokines – chemical messengers of inflammation that could contribute to problems in the brain
  • An immune attack on the brain that may occur in some patients with celiac disease

We at Custom Choice Cereal thought that this was very interesting and worth sharing with you. Please excuse the very ‘medical’ nature of this blog post!

Gluten-free Q&A with Dr. Wangen

As each month draws to an end, Custom Choice Cereal is already looking forward to the first Wednesday of the new month. Today we’ve reached this special day again, and we are excited to announce another Q&A with Dr. Stephen Wangen!

Dr. Stephen WangenSome of you might know Dr. Wangen as the Gluten Free Doctor, others might have read his signature book “Healthier Without Wheat”, and again others might know that he serves on the Board of Trustees for the Gluten Intolerance Group of North America. It is without question that his daily work at the IBS Treatment Center makes Dr. Wangen an expert on anything related to celiac disease or living gluten-free.

This is how it works:

  1. Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
  2. We send your question to Dr. Wangen
  3. We post Dr. Wangen answers in reply to your comments

Dr. Wangen is a busy man, and Custom Choice Cereal is very thankful that he has agreed to provide this great service to all of you. We hope you understand that Stephen will answer the first 5 questions on a fist-come, first-serve basis. We will gladly provide answers or research for you if you’d like us to if your question is posted after this limit has been reached. Alternatively, you can opt to wait until the next Q&A session with Dr. Wangen for your answer.

New York Times on gluten intolerance

The New York Times published another sequel of its great series on celiac disease and gluten intolerance. Custom Choice Cereal pointed out this Q&A with Dr. Sheila Crowe before. Previous topics included symptoms of celiac disease, methods of diagnosis, genetic testing, and celiac disease and infertility. Intolerant to Foods Like Pasta

This time Dr. Crowe answers readers’ questions whether an intolerance to gluten is possible without having celiac disease. Various readers ask very interesting questions, and we bet that some of you wondered the same. Have a look and let us know what you think!

Custom Choice Cereal would like to point the comments on the article because they include further valuable insight. Especially comment number 9 is worthwhile reading – it is written by Dr. Stephen Wangen who answers your questions on our blog on every first Wednesday of the month. Mark your calendars on May 5th for the next Q&A with Dr. Stephen Wangen!

Fourth gluten-free Q&A with Dr. Wangen

Dr. Stephen WangenEvery first Wednesday of the month, Custom Choice Cereal and Dr. Stephen Wangen give you the opportunity to ask any question you might have about celiac disease and living gluten-free. We feel honored that Dr. Wangen, who is also known as The Gluten Free Doctor, has agreed to provide this service and encourage you to take advantage of this.

Dr. Wangen has co-founded the IBS Treatment Center in Seattle, WA, and suffers from celiac disease himself. You can find out more about him in our section on useful gluten-free links.

Here is a quick overview on how it works:

  1. Ask your question as a comment to this blog entry
  2. We send your question to Dr. Wangen
  3. Dr. Wangen answers your questions, usually within 48 hours
  4. We post his answers in reply to your comments here

Please be aware that we can only accept the first 5 questions every month. Custom Choice Cereal will gladly provide answers or research for you if you’d like us to if your question is posted after this limit has been reached. Alternatively, you can opt to wait until the next Q&A session with Dr. Wangen for your question to be answered.

We are looking forward to your questions!

The Gluten Free Doctor on IBS and celiac

Dr. Stephen Wangen is not only the co-founder of the IBS Treatment Center in Seattle, WA, and author of the book “Healthier Without Wheat”, he also blogs as The Gluten Free Doctor. Of course Custom Choice Cereal is very happy that Dr. Wangen agreed to answer your questions on anything celiac or gluten-free every first Wednesday of the month. Please continue to take advantage of these sessions entitled Q&A with Dr. Stephen Wangen as an opportunity to pose your questions to an expert in the field.

Dr. Wangen recently wrote on his blog about an interesting study covering the relationship between IBS and celiac disease. To some it might be “just another statistic” but we thought it was interesting to read that a recent study of 742 IBS patients found that only 3% of them also suffer from celiac disease. This does however not take into account the roughly 20% of IBS patients that are gluten intolerant.

In this context it is important to point out that IBS can be triggered by hundreds of causes, and gluten intolerance is only one of them.

Q&A with gluten-free expert still open

Custom Choice Cereal feels privileged that Dr. Stephen Wangen agreed to answer your questions on celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy and anything around a gluten-free life once a month. The good news: you can still post your questions as comments to yesterday’s third Q&A session with Dr. Wangen blog entry.

GlutenFreeHelp.info logoWe mentioned before that Dr. Wangen wrote the book “Healthier without Wheat”. Tina Turbin from GlutenFreeHelp coincidentally reviewed Dr. Wangen’s book on her blog yesterday. She writes that “My highest respect goes to Dr. Wagnen for his straightforward approach to clarifying the test available for determining celiac disease as well as the testing for non-celiac forms of gluten intolerance. In the end, anyone reading this book will have a full understanding of how wheat can affect one’s life…”

We think that this is a great encouragement to ask Dr. Wangen your questions. It’s a rare opportunity to be able to interact directly with such a high-profile expert, so please don’t be shy!

Third Q&A session with Dr. Wangen

It’s time again for Custom Choice Cereal’s monthly Q&A session with Dr. Stephen Wangen. Dr. Wangen co-founded the IBS Treatment Center in Seattle and also blogs under the name of The Gluten Free Doctor. You are invited to ask anything you’ve always wanted to know about celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy, or the gluten-free diet.

We are very thankful that Dr. Wangen has agreed to provide this outstanding service to you. Out of respect for his busy schedule and because Dr. Wangen informed us that he is traveling this week, we decided to limit the number of questions to a total of 4. Questions will be accepted on a first come, first serve basis.  Since he has only limited access to his emails, it will also take Dr. Wangen a little bit longer to provides his answers. Otherwise everything will work as before in three easy steps:

  1. Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
  2. Dr. Wangen will answer your question and post it as a reply
  3. You read the answer. Simple enough

We hope for your understanding and encourage you to post additional questions at any time to Custom Choice Cereal’s facebook page. We aren’t doctors but will do our best to answer your questions as soon and as best as we can. Please join us in thanking Dr. Wangen for taking the time to answer your questions!