Feb. 20, 2004 -- Intriguing early research suggests that people
with a genetic intolerance to gluten may also be at increased risk for schizophrenia.
Investigators say the link, if proven, could lead to new treatment options for
a small subset of schizophrenic people.
Using a Danish health registry, researchers from John's Hopkins
University's Bloomberg School of Public Health found people with the genetic
digestive disorder known as celiac
disease to be three times as likely as the general population to develop
schizophrenia. Lead researcher William W. Eaton, PhD, says the next step is to
determine if following a gluten-free diet makes a difference in the
symptoms of schizophrenic people with celiac disease. He estimates that 3% of
schizophrenic people could potentially benefit from such a diet.
Celiac disease is a lifelong (chronic) condition in which foods
that contain gluten damage the small intestine. Gluten is a form of protein
found in some grains (notably wheat, barley, and rye). The damage to the
intestine makes it hard for the body to absorb nutrients, especially fat,
calcium, iron, and folate, from food.
"We can now screen for celiac disease, so it is at least
conceivable that we can locate the folks with schizophrenia for whom gluten
withdrawal might work," he tells WebMD. "But we still have to do those
Eaton and colleagues examined the medical histories of 7,997
schizophrenics admitted to a Danish psychiatric facility between 1981 and 1998.
For each case they identified 25 people without the mental disorder, matched by
sex and year of birth.
The researchers found no differences in the rates of other digestive
disorders such as Crohn's
disease and ulcerative colitis between the groups, yet people with
schizophrenia were 3.2 times as likely to have a history of celiac disease as
the comparison group. The findings are reported in the Feb. 21 issue of the
British Journal of Medicine.
It is estimated that about 1% of the population of the U.S. has
celiac disease. Eaton says he hopes to identify a group of people with
schizophrenia who also have celiac disease and then put some of them on
gluten-free diets to determine if the intervention is of therapeutic value.