Treating Celiac Disease with Worms
Treating celiac disease with worms? Is this a Halloween headline, about gluten-free gummy worms? Nope. Read on.
As you might know, a variety of possible treatments for celiac disease are "in the research pipeline" right now. Within the next 5 to 10 years (or maybe sooner), those of us who can't or would rather not manage their celiac disease with a strict gluten-free diet will probably be able to take drugs of one sort or another that will allow at least some small amount of gluten to be eaten without the usual damage. In addition to medications, researchers in Australia are testing a vaccine against celiac disease, which I wrote about a few months ago.
Yesterday on Twitter I learned about another incredible project in Australia. Honestly, if it hadn't been tweeted by someone I respect (@GlutenFreeRN), I'd have been sure it was a joke. But it's for real (and be warned: it's not for the squeamish). As you can read for yourself on the Australian Broadcasting Company web site, worms have been linked to relief of celiac disease.
At Princess Alexandra Hospital in Brisbane, 10 volunteers with celiac disease were infected with live human hookworms. As the article reports, "The parasites burrowed into participants' skin and entered the bloodstream after being applied to the forearm. They then traveled via the lungs to the gut where they happily colonized."
Then, every day for the next 21 weeks, the volunteers ate a few slices of white bread. Another 10 patients with celiac disease, who were not treated with the hookworms, also ate white bread every day, for purposes of comparison. And in fact, the patients with the parasites had less inflammation and less damage in their intestines.
The Australian Broadcasting Company reports that at the end of the trial, the volunteers were offered worm medication to get rid of the parasites, "but all chose to keep their worms."
Why would researchers even think of treating celiac disease patients with worms? On clinicaltrials.gov, a website maintained by the U.S. National Institutes of Health with information on studies being planned or conducted all over the world, I found the answer. The Australian research team explains it this way:
The disappearance of intestinal parasites from humans in developed countries may be responsible for the upsurge in many diseases including Celiac Disease, Crohn's, ulcerative colitis, asthma and hay fever. A parasite's survival relies on its ability to interfere with the host's immune response. The mechanisms employed to do this are similar to those [a person needs to protect against] the so-called autoimmune disorders, diseases in which the system turns on itself. [We] suspect that when parasites are excluded from the environment, some individuals become sufficiently self-reactive to develop an autoimmune disease. American researchers have successfully treated patients with Crohn's and ulcerative colitis using a pig whipworm....[We]have undertaken a similar preliminary study using a human hookworm in Crohn's patients.
What do you think? There needs to be a lot more research on this method before it becomes commonly available. Would you volunteer for a hookworm study?
I remember once, years ago when I was a CNA training to become an RN, I was at UCLA, there was a child whose fingers had been injured. The docs used leeches to try and get the blood circulating in the fingers and it was just amazing. Now, hookworms in the gut, I don’t know, that would gross me out, and I don’t think I would do it. I think that the potential side effects of having worms inside you would be damaging, but I don’t know. I know it is not good for dogs to have worms, so why would it be any different for humans. Just my two cents….
Wow — how bizarre — and yet — it makes sense, doesn’t it?
Like leeches for bloodletting, and maggots that eat dead flesh…
Worms can be our friends?
What creativity!
I’m curious if hookworms can eventually travel to the brain and other areas of the body. I know some parasitic worms do that and wreak havoc upon the victim. Does anyone know if hookworms are among those parasites?
No freaking way I would try this EVER or even read more about it. I am healthier than I have ever been since I started eating gluten free. I am now naturally thin and don’t have to worry about gaining weight. I have more energy than ever thought possible.:)