Coeliac disease may manifest itself as psychosis

Edmond V O`Flaherty, G.P.
Dublin,Ireland

At a course for doctors in nutritional treatment in psychiatry that I attended a year ago in Sydney one point made by the staff of Pfeiffer Center of Chicago (www.hriptc.org)was that 4% of psychotic cases are due to coeliac disease. Immediately I started doing coeliac screening of all my patients with a history of psychosis.

The very first positive one, who had relatively minor bowel discomfort, was a 38 year old lady with a 20 year history of bipolar disorder and numerous
admissions for chronic severe depression.

A few weeks after starting a gluten-free diet her depression lifted and she has remained well since. I believe that all patients with psychotic illness should be screened.

The thought that thousands of people are suffering mental torture when a simple blood test could lead the way to dramatically improving their mental health sounds almost too good to be true but true it is.