In response to my statement: "It makes a lot of sense for the mom to avoid gluten while breastfeeding, given that the dad has the condition." M.Ersilia Armen wrote: "While agreeing in delaying intro of small amounts of gluten till appropriate timing, I disagree with the above statement. In my country we have been started screening for celiac disease well before than in the US (as a matter of fact I remember the title of an american article reading *Where have all the American celiac children gone?* well, they simply did not look for them...) and we carry a mathematically calculated incidence of CD of 1:100 people. I would be very cautious advicing mom avoiding wheat etc when there is CD case in the family, since such an advice would represent only another barrier to breastfeeding." But, that is the point--we do not screen for celiac in the US and given the disastrous nature of celiac, I think mothers ought to know that there is the option of avoiding gluten to protect the infant. Remember, it is the dad who has celiac, so mom understands both the risk and the damage possible. Certainly, I think having the gene test would be a good idea, but as we learn more and more about celiac disease as well as non-celiac gluten intolerance, we may be finding that the lines are blurring and not all of the testing is so very accurate. The blood test depends upon exposure over time and is only a precursor to the biopsy. I would never suggest doing this to an infant, nor would there likely be the damage present for a diagnosis (which I think is incorrect in and of itself and may also leave those with non-celiac gluten intolerance at risk of misunderstanding the importance of avoiding gluten and often ignores the non-digestive symptoms that may depend upon the often-overlooked gliadan antibody test for identification). I am always so confounded by how we think information is a barrier to breastfeeding. IMO, an honest discussion of this topic provides mom with options, from testing, to partial or complete elimination of gluten to artificial feeding. She should also know, of course, that premature weaning has been proven to increase the incidence of developing celiac in at-risk children. Jennifer Tow, IBCLC, CT, USA *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html