Although several years old, this study from Mayo and published in Archives of Neurology is worth a read by anyone interested in the link between celiac disease and cognition. Those with celiac disease have a bad reaction to eating gluten (found in wheat, barley, rye, possibly oats) which causes damage to the small intestine's lining.
Dr. Hu and crew dug in files and found 13 patients who had temporally close onset of GI symptoms and cognitive impairment (age 45-79), who had biopsy proven celiac disease and who had no clear etiology of cognitive change.
Patients had experienced gradual onset of cognitive impairment -- including amnesia, acalculia, confusion and personality change. Not surprising considering the malabsorption of celiac disease, some patients did show deficiencies in B12, folate or Vitamin D. Supplementation did not impact clinical course. However, three patients did evidence improvement of cognitive decline after gluten withdrawal.
So if we see cognitive changes in patients, it seems that celiac disease should be on our radar screen. This is a truly tiny number of cases, but how exciting to be able to consider something so treatable.
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