Analytical Methods To Detect Gluten
Currently, patients with CD are confronted with uncertainties in gluten analysis and, accordingly, may run the risk of inadvertent gluten intake due to inaccurately determined gluten levels. Many methods have been developed for the detection of prolamins, including polymerase chain reaction , liquid chromatographymass spectrometry , and immunological methods based on anti-gluten peptide antibodies. The use of LCMS is difficult because of its cost and technical performance, as well as the complexity of the sample which contains many different peptides. Accordingly, immunoassays such as ELISAs and lateral flow devices have been the methods of choice in the food industry to certify gluten-free food because of their combination of specificity, sensitivity, simplicity, and cost effectiveness . In recent years, methods have been developed for use by celiac patients themselves. Specifically, Nima and EZ GlutentTM LFD have been developed to integrate food processing and gluten detection in a portable device that is available for consumer use .
Why Did We Conduct This Survey
Approximately 7% of Canadians have self-reported as having at least 1 food allergy, but the actual number of medically confirmed food allergies is expected to be slightly lowerFootnote 1. It is believed that the rate of food allergies is increasing, particularly among children. Food allergies are estimated to affect up to 5% of adults and up to 8% of children in developed countriesFootnote 2. Food allergens are food proteins that can cause a reaction of the body’s immune system, and can represent a serious or life threatening health risk for allergic individuals, or contribute to chronic health issues for those with pre-existing health conditions like celiac disease. Celiac disease is a chronic reaction where the body reacts to a component of gluten which can damage or destroy certain intestinal cells. Approximately 1% of the total population are affected with celiac diseaseFootnote 3.
Undeclared allergens can be found in foods due to their presence in the raw ingredients, or can be accidentally introduced along the food production chain through cross contamination. Regardless of the source of the allergens, industry must ensure that the food they produce is safe for human consumption. This can be achieved by complying with specific Canadian regulations where applicable, or by keeping the levels as low as reasonably possible.
All products were tested “as sold,” meaning that they were not prepared as per the manufacturer’s instructions or as they would typically be consumed.
The Myers Way Leaky Gut Breakthrough Program Includes:
- The Myers Way® Guide to the Gut eBook and Leaky Gut Breakthrough® Guide
- Complete Enzymes broad-spectrum blend of proteolytic enzymes I selected to assist with breaking down inflammatory antigens such as lectins
- Probiotic Capsules 100 Billion a high-quality, 14-strain, cutting-edge probiotic to reinoculate your gut with good bacteria
- The Myers Way® Vanilla Bean Paleo Protein delicious vanilla bean protein for all of the smoothies included in the meal plan
- Leaky Gut Revive® excellent source of L-Glutamine, aloe extract, licorice extract, larch arabinogalactan, slippery elm and marshmallow root to nourish your gut cells and maximize gut repair
- The Myers Way® 30-Day Leaky Gut Breakthrough®Recipe Book and Shopping List
After just 30 days, you will find out how incredible it feels to take back your health one gluten-free step at a time. Plus, you can still enjoy delicious and healthy gluten-free options available in stores and restaurants. You can also discover a wealth of gluten-free and dairy-free recipes here on my free blog and in the Autoimmune Solution Cookbook.
Also Check: Where To Buy Gluten Free Crescent Roll Dough
Animal Proteins To Watch Out For
Some protein foods are difficult to assess because there is no nutrition label to look at ingredients or potential allergens.
With the rise in popularity of gluten-free diets many products now advertise using packaging labels that they are gluten-free including cold cuts purchased at the grocery store deli counter.
Double-check and ask if you have questions.
Other processed meats such as hot dogs and sausages may contain wheat products added as a filler or thickener so be sure to check ingredient labels.
Likewise processed meats like pepperoni, salami, and liverwurst may contain gluten unless specified on labels that they are gluten-free.
Also, avoid breaded proteins and use caution with microwavable meals as many contain wheat-based ingredients.
Is There Gluten In Medications
This post about gluten in medications is for informational purposes and is not intended to replace medical advice from a physician or pharmacist. Please read my disclosures.
While the food industry follows specific guidelines related to how much gluten it can include in a product in order for it to be labeled gluten-free , the pharmaceutical industry has no such guidelines.
These means a pill meant to help you feel better might be making you sick if you have celiac disease or a gluten sensitivity. It might also mean youll forgo taking an important medication altogether in order to avoid potential gluten exposure.
Pillbox is a site published by the National Institute of Healths National Library of Medicine. It can be somewhat helpful in helping you decode what ingredients are in your medications.
The data provided by Pillbox includes pictures of how pills look, a list of their active and inactive ingredients, along with other criteria that is useful to consumers, doctors and pharmacists alike.
You can search Pillbox using different keywords. I decided to search for wheat and gluten to see if any medications popped up. Heres what I found:
- 20 medications contain wheat
- 22 contain tapioca
- 14,009 contain starch
As you can see, the vast majority of medications do not contain a named gluten ingredient, however, a big chunk of them contain starch.
This made me take pause.
Pillbox found more than 14,000 medications that contain starch.
Read Also: Substitute For Breadcrumbs Gluten Free
Details Of Medical Expenses
Acoustic coupler prescription needed.
Air conditioner $1,000 or 50% of the amount paid for the air conditioner, whichever is less, for a person with a severe chronic ailment, disease, or disorder prescription needed.
Air filter, cleaner, or purifier used by a person to cope with or overcome a severe chronic respiratory ailment or a severe chronic immune system disorder prescription needed.
Altered auditory feedback devices for treating a speech disorder prescription needed.
Ambulance service to or from a public or licensed private hospital.
Artificial eye or limb can be claimed without any certification or prescription.
Assisted breathing devices that give air to the lungs under pressure, such as a continuous positive airway pressure machine or mechanical ventilator.
Audible signal devices including large bells, loud ringing bells, single stroke bells, vibrating bells, horns, and visible signals prescription needed.
Baby breathing monitor designed to be attached to an infant to sound an alarm if the infant stops breathing. A medical practitioner must certify in writing that the infant is at risk of sudden infant death syndrome prescription needed.
Bathroom aids to help a person get in or out of a bathtub or shower or to get on or off a toilet prescription needed.
Bone conduction receiver can be claimed without any certification or prescription.
Breast prosthesis because of a mastectomy prescription needed.
Dont Forget About Medication
The term gluten-free has been all the craze in the last decade. Many food, health, and wellness companies encourage a gluten-free diet. Not everyone is negatively affected by gluten. However, persons with celiac disease should be especially aware. Persons with celiac disease are great at avoiding foods with gluten. But there should be an emphasis on gluten-free medications too.
Recommended Reading: Jersey Mike’s Gf Menu
The Fdas Guidelines On Gluten In Medications
The FDA says that most medications dont contain any gluten , and if they do, its a very trace amount that the FDA says is safe for someone with celiac disease to ingest. The FDA adds that barley and rye are either used rarely or not at all in the production of medications.
Specifically, the FDA says, The amount of gluten potentially present in a unit dose of an oral drug product is less than the amount of gluten that could potentially be found in a single serving of a cookie labeled gluten-free in accordance with FDAs regulations.
Based on this information, the FDA concludes, Individuals who respond well to a gluten-free diet are at low risk of experiencing problems as a result of the possible presence of gluten in a drug product. This information is all according to an FDA December 2017 report titled, Gluten in Drug Products and Associated Labeling Recommendations Guidance for Industry.
All this sounds lovely but what about the 2019 study that says 18 percent of medications contain gluten? The studys finding are contradictory to what the FDA says. Confused yet? I know I am!
The FDA is making strides in encouraging the disclosure of gluten in medications , but the agency hasnt gone far enough to product the celiac and gluten sensitive communities.
In the report, the FDA says if a drug manufacturer wants to make statements about gluten on its label, it should use the following language : Contains no ingredient made from a gluten-containing grain .
Promising Celiac Disease Drugs In The Pipeline
Right now, the only available treatment for celiac disease is a gluten-free diet. But that may soon be changing.
A number of drug manufacturers are currently conducting clinical trials to assess the safety and effectiveness of a number of novel drug agents. Each has a different approach and mechanism of action . It is hoped that by inhibiting a process of this disorder, we may one day entirely erase celiac disease from the lexicon of autoimmune illnesses.
The most promising candidates in the drug pipeline include the following.
Also Check: Does Italian Dressing Have Gluten
What Are Targeted Surveys
Targeted surveys are used by the CFIA to focus its surveillance activities on areas of higher health risk. The information gained from these surveys provides support for the allocation and prioritization of the Agency’s activities to areas of greater concern. Targeted surveys are a valuable tool for generating information on certain hazards in foods, identifying and characterizing new and emerging hazards, informing trend analysis, prompting and refining health risk assessments, highlighting potential contamination issues, as well as assessing and promoting compliance with Canadian regulations.
Food safety is a shared responsibility. The agency works with federal, provincial, territorial and municipal governments and provides regulatory oversight of the food industry to promote safe handling of foods throughout the food production chain. The food industry and retail sectors in Canada are responsible for the food they produce and sell, while individual consumers are responsible for the safe handling of the food they have in their possession.
Q: What Should I Do If I Think Im Getting Glutened By My Medicine
A: Your first step should be to call your physician to let them know that youre experiencing symptoms. Do not stop taking prescription medicine without talking to your doctor first. There may be reasons aside from gluten exposure that you are experiencing symptoms, such as side effects of the prescribed medication. It is important to understand that some common side effects of medicines overlap with gluten exposure. Similarly, sugar alcohols in medications can cause significant stomach discomfort that could be easily confused with symptoms of gluten exposure. Beyond Celiac strongly recommends that you share your concerns and any symptoms with your doctor as soon as possible. Call the manufacturer to ask about the sources of their inactive ingredients as well as their production processes and any steps taken to prevent gluten exposure.
Also Check: Is Wishbone Italian Dressing Gluten Free
Gluten In Medications: A Hot Topic
How can you successfully manage celiac disease if medications you need contain gluten?
Gluten-free claims on packaged foods and supplements are regulated by the US Food and Drug Administration and standards are in place requiring manufacturers to call out certain common allergens if they are included in a packaged food. Unfortunately, similar laws are not in place for labeling gluten in medications, although a proposed bill was reintroduced to Congress in September 2015.
On April 3, 2019, Representative Tim Ryan introduced H.R. 2074, the Gluten in Medicine Disclosure Act of 2019 to the House of Energy and Commerce Committees Subcommittee on Health. If passed, the bill would amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to require gluten be labeled in all medications.
On December 11, 2019, Senator Richard Blumenthal introduced S.3021, to the Senate, Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. This bill is meant to amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to require the label of a drug that is intended for human use and contains an ingredient that is derived directly or indirectly from a gluten-containing grain to identify each such ingredient, and for other purposes. It will also be known as the Gluten in Medicine Disclosure Act of 2019 and uses the same language as H.R. 2074, the bill Representative Tim Ryan introduced to the House in April.
There are risks for the celiac disease community when gluten is left off a medication label:
Protecting Yourself From Possible Gluten In Medication Look For Wheat Starch
Currently, there is no law mandating that drug manufacturers disclose the source of these excipients in any public record or database, so we must rely on calling the manufacturer to obtain information.
Some drug companies are transparent with their information, while others either give incomplete or even false information. Often, you are told that the company does not use any gluten in the manufacturing of their product, but they wont guarantee that its gluten-free.
As a consumer, how do you protect yourself when trying to obtain information regarding the gluten status of a drug when the information you are receiving is either incomplete or questionable?
It is highly unlikely that any excipient other than starch will contain any measurable amount of gluten.
As mentioned earlier, the most likely source of gluten contamination will come from starch. It is highly unlikely that any excipient other than starch will contain any measurable amount of gluten.
When the excipient listed for the product contains the single word starch, it can come from any starch source. In the food industry, plain starch must be derived from corn, but this regulation does not apply to the pharmaceutical industry.
Finally, there is the rare occasion when you see the words wheat starch. By using the two FDA websites mentioned above, you can frequently find the source of the starch.
Recommended Reading: Where To Buy Schar Gluten Free Puff Pastry
Strengths And Limitations Of Study
Our measurement of gluten intake was based on the assumption that gluten comprised 75% of the protein content of wheat, rye, and barley, following the convention of a single conversion factor for all three grains.2223 Although this may overestimate the amount of gluten intake for rye and barley, it is unlikely to bias our results given the overall low intake of rye and barley in these cohorts. Although gluten has not been specifically quantified in validation studies of food frequency questionnaires, this instrument has shown good validity with regard to reasonable correlation with seven day dietary recall of foods containing gluten and intake of vegetable protein, to which gluten is a significant contributor.29 In addition, participants with undiagnosed celiac disease were not uniformly identified in these cohorts. However, according to population based estimates, such people would account for less than 1% of the cohort.3 Moreover, inclusion of these participants would be expected to bias the results toward an association of gluten with coronary heart disease, which was not observed.
