Gluten Free Lifestyle

"Celiac Disease and gluten intolerance are sensitivities to the gluten in wheat. People with celiac disease have a genetic predisposition, causing the proteins in wheat, barley and rye to create an inflammatory process in the small intestine. For a person with celiac disease, it is absolutely mandatory to maintain a strict diet for life. Currently there is no other treatment. The "gluten-free" lifestyle also reduces the risk of many other diseases, including cancer, caused by the inflammatory process. What Nurses Know...Gluten-Free Living provides the medical advice that people expect from nurses. Each chapter opens with a first-person vignette and since the "gluten-free" diet is challenging, the book is written to inform and encourage individuals, while also emphasizing nutrition. Written in a user-friendly style, it will be easy for people to access the information they want and need without dealing with complex data or details"-- "This book is written by an individual who has lived with celiac disease (CD) for fourteen years and has practiced nursing for over forty-five years. Immediately after being diagnosed, at age sixty, she began to read all that she could find about the condition. The first book that she wrote took about four years of gathering information. It took many hours of researching to find even basic information. There is no longer this void for information, but there still remains some confusion on the differences among CD, gluten intolerance, and gluten allergies. CD and gluten intolerance have finally become more recognizable names in recent years. The disease and its recognition is the challenge of the next generation. The amount of research in the past ten years has certainly quadrupled. That means that there is more known about it and physicians are now starting to realize that it is really the tip of the iceberg of a group of symptoms that, prior to this, were really not dealt with. The purpose of this book is to provide scientific, evidence-based information about CD, gluten intolerance, and gluten allergies and the differences among the three. There are first-person stories from individuals who have one of these conditions and the situations that arise around them. It is her goal as the author to provide basic information that will give individuals and families the knowledge of how to live with the challenges of living a gluten-free lifestyle. The following chapters provide resources, general information, and personal testimonies that will encourage each reader to act in a positive manner to make gluten-free living a way of life and not a challenge"--