Why Do Kids Get Celiac Disease?

No one is sure why celiac disease happens, but it appears to run in families. You have a 5-10% chance of getting celiac disease if someone in your family has it. It's common in people from the northern European countries and the United States. How common? About 1 in every 133 people in the United States has celiac disease.

Obviously, many people who have celiac disease do not know it. If all these people were diagnosed, celiac disease would be more common than type 1 diabetes. Fortunately, awareness is growing about the problem, and there are better ways of testing people for it.
Signs and Symptoms

Some common symptoms of celiac disease are diarrhea, decreased appetite, stomachache and bloating, poor growth, and weight loss. Many kids are diagnosed with it when they're between 6 months and 2 years old. It makes sense because, at this time kids are getting their first taste of gluten in foods.

For some people, the problems occur gradually and the symptoms may be terrible one week and not as bad the next. Because of this, some people aren't diagnosed with celiac disease until they're older. The problem is chronic, which means that although symptoms may come and go, people who have celiac disease will always have it.

Someone with celiac disease may feel tired and could be irritable. Some also have skin rashes and mouth sores. The problem is sometimes mistaken for other digestive problems called inflammatory bowel disease or lactose intolerance. And in some cases, a kid won't have any symptoms and then will all of a sudden start having problems during a time of stress, such as after an injury.