A study conducted by AIIMS in 2011 including 2,800 patients, revealed that one in 100 patients in North India suffers from the disease
Little did Tanya Adhikari, a 20-year-old Delhi University student, know that what stopped her growth and delayed her puberty was nothing but her love for food that contained gluten. When all her school friends talked about getting their periods and her own body did not show any changes even in class 10, her parents got worried and took her to AIIMS, where she was confirmed to have been suffering from Celiac disease.
Celiac is an auto-immune disease that occurs due to body's inability to digest gluten, a protein present in cereals like wheat and barley.
In the last eight years, AIIMS has seen over 1,100 patients in their adult clinic and a little over 800 in paediatrics making it almost 2,000 patients in just one hospital. The weekly clinic attends to over 70-80 new patients every month, who cannot digest gluten and thus face numerous other issues because of it.
"I have been avoiding gluten since I was diagnosed. It gets difficult as I cannot eat out with my friends and if I do, it leads to diarrhoea, mood swings and sometimes even affects my menstrual cycle," says Tanya, who has been on a strict gluten-free diet along with some calcium.
"We only get food from stores where they have gluten free stuff available. Though it is expensive i.e., a single samosa may cost Rs 100, but it helps me with my problem," she adds.
Tanya got this gene from her mother, Seema Adhikari, who was also diagnosed after she did, but Celiac has not affected her life as much as it has Tanya's. Since she has been maintaining the diet and medicines, Tanya has seen a change in her body, with normal growth.
Celiac can cause mood swings, irritation, short stature, diarrhoea, and sometimes remains ignored for years, leading to its severity.
"We see at least 20-25 new patients every week. Not that it did not exist earlier but poor awareness rarely got the disease diagnosed. Even 20 years back, there was no Celiac in the US, does not mean it did not exist," says Dr Govind Makharia, Professor, Department of Gastroenterology, AIIMS.
THE STUDY
- A study conducted by AIIMS in 2011 including 2,800 patients, revealed that one in 100 patients in North India suffers from the disease
- In a nationwide study later, with 23k subjects, it was confirmed that at least 0.6% had celiac disease, and is more common in the north than it is in the south
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