CLINICAL MANIFESTATIONS AND DIAGNOSIS OF CELIAC DISEASE IN CHILDREN

Celiac disease (CD) is defined as a permanent intolerance to gluten with clinical manifestations and abnormal small intestinal mucosa. A case series study was performed to obtain information about clinical manifestations, age of presentation and diagnosis of CD. For this purpose, hospital records of patients who were admitted to the gastrointestinal ward in the Children's Medical Center from 1986 to 1996 with suspected diagnosis of CD and discharged with such a diagnosis were reviewed. Thirty-five patients (17 male, 18 female) with diagnostic criteria for CD were selected and followed, The average age of onset was 3.07 years but mean age of diagnosis (the first small intestinal biopsy) was 7.7 years. The most common symptom was chronic diarrhea. The interval between initial symptoms and diagnosis was surprisingly long. During this period these subjects had multiple medical visits at different hospitals. With recognition of this treatable disorder and by available diagnostic procedures and obtaining small intestinal biopsy specimens, we can reduce the mentioned interval and diagnose this entity earlier in Iranian children.