Healthier Without Wheat

Stephen MDiv Wangen

Description

Healthier Without Wheat is the leading resource for understanding, diagnosing, and living with reactions to wheat and gluten. Critically acclaimed by Library Journal, and a 2010 Book of the Year Finalist for ForeWord Magazine, Healthier Without Wheat makes sense of a complex issue and explains why millions of people feel better when they avoid gluten. Dr. Wangen, a gluten intolerant physician, has an easy-to-understand writing style and uses patient stories with scientific facts to clearly explain how gluten intolerance causes numerous maladies and is often difficult to recognize. Most importantly, this book substantiates the much larger world of non-celiac gluten intolerance.

Sujets

• Allergies
• Health
• Fitness

Informations

• Publié par: eBookIt.com
• Date de parution: 21 février 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9780976853770
• Langue: English

Extrait

Healthier
without
Wheat
 
A NEW UNDERSTANDING OF WHEAT ALLERGIES, CELIAC DISEASE, AND NON-CELIAC GLUTEN INTOLERANCE
 
 
DR. STEPHEN WANGEN
The Gluten-Free Doctor
 
AUTHOR OF
The Irritable Bowel Syndrome Solution
 
www.HealthierWithoutWheat.com

 
 
Copyright © 2009 by Stephen Wangen

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher.
 
Published in eBook format by Innate Health Publishing
11300 Roosevelt Way, NE, Suite 100, Seattle, WA 98125
www.HealthierWithoutWheat.com
 
Converted by http://www.eBookIt.com
 
 
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wangen, Stephen
Healthier Without Wheat: A New Understanding of Wheat Allergies, Celiac Disease, and Non-Celiac Gluten Intolerance / Stephen Wangen
ISBN 978-0-9768537-7-0
1. Gluten-Free Diet 2. Celiac Disease 3. Wheat-Free Diet 4. Food Allergies 5. Health
 
 
Library of Congress Control Number: 2008925557
 
 
 
 
 
Cover design by Dunn and Associates
 
 
The author may be contacted at the IBS Treatment Center: www.IBSTreatmentCenter.com, [e-mail] .
Disclaimers
 
This book is not intended as a substitute for the medical recommendations of physicians or other healthcare providers. It is intended to offer information to help the reader cooperate with physicians and health professionals so that they may work together to find better health.
The publisher and the author are not responsible for any products or services offered or referred to in this book and expressly disclaim all liability in connection with the use of any such products or services and for any damage, loss, or expense to person or property arising out of or relating to them.
All stories contained in this book are based on actual case studies, but the names and other details have been changed.


 
 
In Remembrance of Louise Shadduck.
1916–2008
 
Dedication
 
This book is dedicated to the millions of people who suffer from gluten intolerance and lack the support or acknowledgement of the medical community, and the millions more who have yet to be diagnosed with a problem that is sitting on their plate.
It is also dedicated to the numerous researchers who continue to investigate the relationship between food allergies and health, yet rarely get to see their research put to practical use.
 
Acknowledgements
 
I must thank Marcus Homer Merriman, history professor at the University of Lancaster, England, for once compelling a young student to closely examine the effectiveness of his writing.
This book could not have been written without the help of Susan Fitzgerald, editor extraordinaire. And I wish to thank the Gluten Intolerance Group of North America and its associated branch groups in the Seattle area for giving me voice in my early days as a physician. Largely through their interest and support I developed and refined my knowledge of gluten intolerance.
I would also like to thank my patients, who have had a significant influence on how I practice medicine and have taught me how to provide quality healthcare.
And thank you Tara, Roman, and Lucia for your patience during this long endeavor.
 


 
 
How to contact the IBS Treatment Center
 
Dr. Wangen and Innate Health Publishing are headquartered at the IBS Treatment Center in Seattle, Washington.
 
Phone: [phone]
Toll free: 1–888–546–6283, 1–888–5INNATE
 
Websites:
www.HealthierWithoutWheat.com
and
www.IBSTreatmentCenter.com
 

 
INTRODUCTION
 
When I picture a field of wheat, I can imagine myself enjoying a day of cycling up and down the rolling hills of Middle America. You can probably imagine something similar. Fields of wheat invoke a sense of peace and are almost synonymous with our country, and in a wider sense, wheat is a central part of Western civilization. The importance of this grain to our economy and its assumed presence on our dinner tables might explain our difficulty in perceiving it as a problem. Yet for many, including myself, the grain that is an icon of our culture is also the source of great distress.
This book is about identifying whether or not someone has a problem with wheat or gluten. This is an extremely important subject and may explain why many millions of people suffer from a variety of health concerns. Healthier Without Wheat is the result of over 10 years of clinical practice working with and testing thousands of patients. The number of people who react to wheat and gluten, and the profound difference seen in their health when they stop eating them, never ceases to amaze me. This book is also based on a significant amount of independent research published in the medical literature (cited in the bibliography), much of which has focused on celiac disease. That research takes on a whole new meaning when viewed in a different light, a light that I’ve attempted to brighten with this book.
Things that we take for granted are often not as simple as they appear, and the potential health ramifications of eating wheat is one example of this. Ironically, the public seems to be well ahead of the medical community in appreciating this issue. It is my hope that the medical community will catch up and put itself in a better position to provide answers to the many people that still need our help.
One of the key components to enhancing this educational process can be found in the use of the words allergy and intolerance . These two words are often used rather loosely or inconsistently, both in the healthcare arena and in the popular vernacular, though they really refer to two very different issues. Because they lack standardization, they often cause confusion when used to discuss reactions to food. I believe that this prevents us from appreciating the true significance of how we react to foods and the full scope of those reactions.
In my first book, The Irritable Bowel Syndrome Solution , I attempted to provide a clear foundation for scientifically defining the words allergy and intolerance . However, when it comes to discussing gluten, I felt that trying to address the differences between them might interfere with the bottom line, which is to help people be healthy. Therefore in this book I have, for the most part, left the debate of allergy versus intolerance alone. However, you will see occasional references to this issue, in particular in the footnotes, which I hope you will find interesting. And I more specifically address it in Chapter 12.
The book is divided into five parts. In Part I, I discuss how wheat became such a major part of our diet and the problems that wheat and gluten cause for many people. In Part II, I discuss celiac disease, which is important to understand in order to appreciate Part III, which examines non-celiac forms of gluten intolerance as well as wheat and gluten allergies. In Part IV, I summarize the information I’ve presented in earlier chapters on testing for all forms of gluten intolerance and for wheat and gluten allergies. Finally, Part V discusses the treatment of gluten intolerance and, maybe more importantly, what to do when your symptoms aren’t relieved by avoiding wheat or gluten, because, although wheat and gluten problems are very important issues, they often go hand in hand with other food allergies and intolerances.
I hope that you find Healthier Without Wheat not only informative but thought provoking. And I sincerely hope that it will lead you to a better state of health.
 
Part I: Wheat and the Problems It Can Cause
 

CHAPTER 1: The Whole of Wheat
 
Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie.
— William Shakespeare (1564–1616), All’s Well That Ends Well
 
In a broad sense this is really a story about our assumptions regarding food. We love it. We hate it. We crave it. But do we really understand what we’re eating? Almost all of our thoughts about food focus on either satisfying our taste buds or evaluating what it will do to our waistlines. Most people don’t consider the most fundamental issue: Did nature ever intend for us to eat what we eat?
 
Challenging the Health Assumption
Whether or not we are really designed to eat wheat is an incredibly important question. Humans, like all living organisms, are the product of millions of years of evolution. We have been molded by nature to function in a very specific way and when we veer from this design, we suffer consequences. In this way we are not so unlike a car. If you put diesel into a gasoline engine, you wreck the engine. Or consider your favorite zoo animals. Zookeepers try to feed them the same kinds of foods they’ve been eating for millennia, because they know that the wrong food would make them sick.
However, we humans have a belief that somehow we can overcome or improve upon nature. We eat what we want to eat, or what we are told is good for us, without truly understanding how food and its components affect our bodies.
We make a lot of assumptions about our food. Perhaps the largest is that the major agricultural products in our country are healthy for humans. They may taste good and they may be full of nutrients, but just because something tastes good and contains nutrients doesn’t necessarily mean that it is nutritious , or nutritious for everyone.
This may sound almost too ridiculous to believe. But as we examine the history of food and the history of humans, you may be surprised to learn that most of what we eat today isn’t what humans have eaten throughout most of history. You may also be surprised to learn that what makes up our diet has more to do with economics than with health.
Wheat is part of nearly every meal in America. And most people eat it without a second thought. Yet millions potentially damage their health at nearly every meal without even realizing it