Important studies published in 2020 highlight that coeliac disease is a systemic autoimmune-like disorder with the potential to result in serious long-term health consequences that might also occur outside the gastrointestinal tract. Ultimately, the results of these studies will enable the development of better strategies for the management of coeliac disease.
Key advances
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Patients with coeliac disease have cognitive defects, signs of worsened mental health and evidence of white matter damage in the brain compared with matched controls2.
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Despite improved diagnostics and treatment of coeliac disease, diagnosed coeliac disease is still associated with increased mortality risk compared with control population, and the increased risk persists beyond 10 years after diagnosis. The risk of death is especially related to cancer and cardiovascular and respiratory diseases4.
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Undiagnosed and therefore untreated coeliac disease can have serious long-term health consequences: individuals with untreated disease have been found to have an increased risk of cardiovascular diseases and cancers that can occur outside the gastrointestinal tract8.
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Kaukinen, K. Updates on systemic consequences of coeliac disease. Nat Rev Gastroenterol Hepatol 18, 87–88 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41575-020-00387-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41575-020-00387-0
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