Managing Gluten Intolerance and Celiac Disease

Many people suffer from unexplained symptoms such as irritable bowel syndrome, gas and bloating, chronic skin problems, chronic fatigue and many other continuous or intermittent conditions with no clinical diagnosis or apparent remedy. Some of these people are experiencing what was once thought to be a rare inherited digestive disorder called celiac disease (also known as coeliac sprue or gluten intolerance). Celiac disease is still poorly understood, but it is known to be an auto-immune disease that is triggered by the presence of gluten in some people who are genetically susceptible. In the most extreme situation, children become gluten intolerant during the first two years of life and must endure a life-long avoidance of all foods containing gluten. There is some evidence that the age when gluten is introduced has some influence on the development of childhood onset celiac disease. The pathology of celiac disease is both direct and indirect. The direct pathology is a breakdown of the intestinal villi due to the apparent autoimmune response to proteins made by tissue transglutaminase from partially digested gluten. The symptoms of the direct response would include irritable bowel, bloating, and stomach pain. Indirect pathology could result from nutritional deficiencies and the consequences of chronic inflammation. These symptoms would include headache, chronic fatigue and skin eruptions. The only way to manage celiac disease is a strict avoidance of foods containing gluten, but sometimes even that may not be enough. Daily GlutenAceTM is designed to assist people who are following a strict gluten free diet by reducing the impact of food contamination with small amounts of gluten and by reducing intestinal inflammation with digestive enzymes and herbs that reduce inflammatory responses. Daily GlutenAceTM is a digestive product designed to help break down gluten peptides and reduce intestinal inflammation using the following 3 ingredients.

BioCore DPP IV™Digestive Enzyme
A group at Stanford University isolated a 33 amino acid peptide from partially digested gluten that appears to be the offensive part of gluten in celiac disease. The 33 segment was especially rich in proline, leucine, and glutamine. BioCoreDPP IVTM consists of 3 protein digesting enzymes from Aspergillus oryzae and Aspergillus melleus that have the ability to digest peptide bonds (protein linking chemical bonds) with proline and leucine.

These enzymes are capable of digesting small amounts of the gluten peptide, hopefully rendering it harmless. It has been shown that the proline-glutamine bonds are especially resistant to digestive breakdown, but that adding additional enzymes can sometimes facilitate the process. These enzymes have also been demonstrated to be able to break down tumor necrosis factor, a highly inflammatory product of immune cells.

Bromelain
Bromelain is a pineapple derived protein digesting enzyme. It is normally a crude extract containing a variety of proteolytic enzymes, many of which have anti-inflammatory properites. Bromelain has been frequently used as a general digestive aid because of its ability to digest proteins. Hale, et al. from Duke
University studied bromelain in a rat model of spontaneous ulcerative colitis in response to reports of remission of that disease in two patients who were refractory to standard treatments. The rats taking oral bromelain had significantly less severe bowel inflammation than those not taking bromelain.
Oral bromelain has also been shown to help restore normal gut function after abdominal surgery in rats8. Bromelain has not been shown to help celiac disease specifically, but indirect evidence shows that it has a good chance of reducing inflammation in the gut due to multiple causes.

Quercetin
Quercetin is one of the most important bioflavonoids in foods and is especially concentrated in green and black teas, onions, and apples. Quercetin is a potent antioxidant and anti-inflammatory agent9. The anti-inflammatory properties of
quercetin have been demonstrated in several types of cells, and shown to have valuable protective effects.

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