Serological Tests Assessment in Patients Suspected to have Celiac Disease Attending the Gastroenterology and Hepatology Teaching Hospital in Baghdad

Abstract

Background: Celiac disease is characterized by small intestinal malabsorption of nutrients after the ingestionof wheat gluten or related proteins from rye and barley, villus atrophy of the small intestinal mucosa, promptclinical and histologic improvement following strict adherence to a gluten-free diet, and relapse when glutenis retaken.Aim of the Study: Evaluation of patients seeking gastroenterology and hepatology teaching hospital/medicalcity/Baghdad with suspected celiac disease regarding serological investigation, histological findings andgenetic testing, to determine sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive valuefor every test.Patients and Method: The study is a cross sectional descriptive analytic study conducted at the teachinghospital of gastroenterology and hepatology/Baghdad/Iraq during a period from the 1st of February 2018 tothe 1st of April 2019. After thorough history and Clinical examination patients with suspected celiac diseasewere sent for serological investigation (TTG IgA and IgG), (antigliadin IgA and IgG), all patients were sentfor endoscopic examination for duodenal biopsies with subsequent histological assessment. Patients whofailed to be confirmed (positive serology and negative histology or vice versa) were sent either for HLAgenotyping or for IgG Deaminated gliadin peptide. Sensitivity & specificity were measured for each test.Results: A total of 140 suspected celiac disease patients involved in this study. Mean age was 18.9 yearsand ranged from 2 years to 60 years. Male represented 36.4% of the cases while female represented 63.6%.Only 19 patients show positive family history of celiac disease (13.6 %). Regarding associated autoimmunediseases, the majority (111 patients) have no associated diseases (79.3%) while the other patients who haveassociations most of them show positive association with type 1 DM (16.4%).Fifty patients (35.7%) presented with short stature, (25.7%) came with diarrhea. The other symptoms varybetween bloating and distention, unexplained anemia and weight loss. Constipation was seen in one patient.tTG IgA and tTG IgG showed high sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictivevalue while antigliadin antibody failed to show these significant results.Conclusion: The use of serologic markers inceliac is easy, direct, noninvasive and reliableand could be benefit in the diagnosis andmonitoring of the disease. More specifically,both the tTG-IgA/IgG are very good markersin the diagnostis of CD. This study confirmedthe high specificity and sensitivity of tTG, and the low results of AGA, but celiac serology does not replace the biopsy in the diagnosis but is useful as anassistant for diagnosis.