Celiac Disease Vaccine Studies Start This Month in Australia
The scientist heading the research is Dr. Bob Anderson, of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne. According to a press release from the Institute, “If the vaccine development…of Dr Anderson and his scientific team prove successful, a strict gluten free diet for celiacs could become a thing of the past.”
The point of the vaccine would be to induce autoimmune tolerance to gluten, so the celiac patient's body would not react in the usual manner and no damage would be inflicted on the small intestine. Before the vaccine's effectiveness can be confirmed, however, the researchers must first conduct what’s known as a “Phase I trial” to verify how the vaccine acts and affects the body, the side effects associated with increasing doses, and early evidence of effectiveness. The study starting this month in Australia is a Phase I trial. Using forty volunteers with celiac disease, the researchers will attempt to determine the appropriate vaccine dose and to identify any side effects.
Dr. Anderson has been studying the role of gluten in celiac disease for many years. In the press release, he said, “As both a celiac disease researcher and treating gastroenterologist, I am in an interesting position. I have overseen my basic scientific discovery about the troublesome elements in gluten being translated into an experimental vaccine that may eventually help my patients.…The vaccine itself is intended to gradually desensitize the celiac sufferer, so that gluten is tolerated. Consequently, the villi in the small intestine should revive and absorb nutrients in the normal way. Ideally, that would mean the end of gluten-free diets for people with celiac disease.”
A web page devoted to Dr. Anderson and his work points out that while researchers around the world are working to develop drugs that might help patients with celiac disease, “Many of the drugs under development for celiac disease are likely to supplement the gluten free diet and simply provide a safeguard against inadvertent gluten exposure.” Vaccines such as the one his group is testing, on the other hand, “are likely to replace the gluten free diet if they prove efficacious.”
In approximately one year from now, if the Phase 1 trial is judged to have been successful, a larger Phase II trial will be conducted with more participants to confirm that the vaccine actually works, according to the press release.
Read about other recent advances in celiac disease research.
Comments
We need this in the US! Especially for children. I was not diagnosed until adulthood, and then only after being seriously hospitalised. I found this book very helpful: glutenfreeenterprises.com – you can get it cheaper on Amazon.com. Also, now that I have been surfing the web, I have found several useful websites.
Now, they also need to realize that the immune system of many celiacs also reacts to casein similarly to how it reacts to gluten. This helps solve a lot of the problem, but not all of it.