Custom Choice Cereal is very proud to have been featured on ABC26 WGNO New Orleans this past Friday during Good Morning New Orleans. Molly Kimball gives advice on how to stay fit without changing one’s lifestyle in her show “Get the Skinny with Molly”, and this time she talked about gluten-free foods.

We really like that Molly has done her homework, points out a few products that contain the evil “hidden” gluten, and mentions how to get tested for celiac disease. Watch and listen what Molly has to say about Custom Choice Cereal’s gluten-free cereal starting exactly 2:00 minutes into the video below. She thinks that our custom gluten-free cereal mixes make a great gift for an Easter basket, and we can only agree with her!

It is the nature of operating in the gluten-free food space that we at Custom Choice Cereal read about links between celiac disease and various other conditions. Most prominent are the connection of celiac disease and type I diabetes or the controversially discussed relation to autism (or the “leaky gut” as a symptom).

We just came across a article published on the blog RonPaulIsHope that discussed the possible relationship between celiac disease and asthma. It mentions that

• a 2005 study of (a small sample of ) 86 celiacs in the Maltese islands revealed that 27.8% of them also had asthma.  Asthma was thus was statistically significant more common in patients with celiac disease than in the general Maltese population
• asthma preceeded celiac disease in 16 patients, and a “gluten-free diet had led to improvement in asthma in 6 patients, possible improvement in 2 patients, and no change in 8 patients” in the 2005 study
• a 2001 study in Finland looked at the 1987 Finnish Medical Birth Register data of 60,254 births and concluded that “the cumulative incidence of asthma in children with celiac disease (24.6%) [...] was significantly higher than in children without it (3.4%)”

We can only reiterate the conclusion that is drawn at the end of the article: the studies do not prove a causal relationship between celiac disease and asthma. However, they suggest that they might be correlated. Hopefully this will be the subject of further research.

The main take-away is that if you suffer from celiac disease or gluten intolerance and have asthma, going on a gluten-free diet can help reduce the severity of your asthma.

Custom Choice Cereal came across a great resource providing nutrition information and access to registered dietitians that we absolutely had to share with you. The website of the American Dietetic Association is very well organized and provides a wealth of guidelines and advice on how to eat right. It is their mission is to provide “Food and Nutrition Information You Can Trust”.

We were especially intrigued by a particular service they provide: finding a registered dietitian in your area. The search mask allows you to filter by zip code or State, a certain mile radius, and also gives an option to specify the service you are looking for (individual consultation, group consultation or programs/workshops). Custom Choice Cereal thought that the best part is the selection of 26 “specialties”, including

• Alternative Nutrition
• Digestive Disorders
• Gastrointestinal Diseases/Disorders
• Celiac Disease
• Diabetes/Hypoglycemia
• Food Allergies/Intolerances
• Weight Control
• Sports Nutrition

Search results display names, addresses, phone numbers, areas of expertise, a list of services provided and languages the services are offered in. Overall a great site that we highly recommend!

Custom Choice Cereal came across a review of a book describing what seems to be a very interesting approach to a healthy diet. The book is called “Going against the Grain” and was reviewed by Liz Schau on the Tampa Gluten Free Examiner.

Author Melissa Diane Smith challenges the common advice that grains should be the foundation of our diet. She writes that quite the contrary is true as grains are connected to a variety of conditions, including celiac disease, gluten intolerance, obesity, diabetes, Syndrome X, autoimmune disorders, allergies, and digestive problems. She therefore takes a rather radical view, addressing the nutritional problems of grains and suggesting their elimination from our diets.

One of our New Year resolutions was to read a book every month, so we are very happy to have another candidate that makes it to our list. It will beyond doubt be an interesting read!

Custom Choice Cereal feels privileged that Dr. Stephen Wangen agreed to answer your questions on celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy and anything around a gluten-free life once a month. The good news: you can still post your questions as comments to yesterday’s third Q&A session with Dr. Wangen blog entry.

We mentioned before that Dr. Wangen wrote the book “Healthier without Wheat”. Tina Turbin from GlutenFreeHelp coincidentally reviewed Dr. Wangen’s book on her blog yesterday. She writes that “My highest respect goes to Dr. Wagnen for his straightforward approach to clarifying the test available for determining celiac disease as well as the testing for non-celiac forms of gluten intolerance. In the end, anyone reading this book will have a full understanding of how wheat can affect one’s life…”

We think that this is a great encouragement to ask Dr. Wangen your questions. It’s a rare opportunity to be able to interact directly with such a high-profile expert, so please don’t be shy!

It’s time again for Custom Choice Cereal’s monthly Q&A session with Dr. Stephen Wangen. Dr. Wangen co-founded the IBS Treatment Center in Seattle and also blogs under the name of The Gluten Free Doctor. You are invited to ask anything you’ve always wanted to know about celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy, or the gluten-free diet.

We are very thankful that Dr. Wangen has agreed to provide this outstanding service to you. Out of respect for his busy schedule and because Dr. Wangen informed us that he is traveling this week, we decided to limit the number of questions to a total of 4. Questions will be accepted on a first come, first serve basis.  Since he has only limited access to his emails, it will also take Dr. Wangen a little bit longer to provides his answers. Otherwise everything will work as before in three easy steps:

1. Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
2. Dr. Wangen will answer your question and post it as a reply
3. You read the answer. Simple enough

We hope for your understanding and encourage you to post additional questions at any time to Custom Choice Cereal’s facebook page. We aren’t doctors but will do our best to answer your questions as soon and as best as we can. Please join us in thanking Dr. Wangen for taking the time to answer your questions!

Not only do we believe that a healthy and balanced diet is important for one’s overall well-being, Custom Choice Cereal also experienced this first hand. When Zach from Gluten Free Raleigh gave us the great advice to shop only along the perimeter of the grocery store about one-and-a-half months ago we took his advice to heart. Some of the key improvements that we experienced are

• less trouble getting up in the morning (“better” sleep)
• more energy
• just the right weight loss (in time for spring )

A website that we wanted to point out in this context is Health by Gini. It states on her website that “Gini Warner has developed nutritional programs for [...] food allergies and overall nutritional balance.” Her allergy program specifically mentions gluten (wheat), dairy, eggs and nuts. She emailed us that she also covers shellfish and soy. Since we are not sure if “nuts” means tree nuts and/or peanuts this means she covers almost all of the “big eight” allergens (with the exception of fish and possibly tree nuts/peanuts).

Gini provides counseling over the phone to anyone who cannot come to her office. She also has a couple of impressive testimonials on her website, and if anyone has tried her services we’d be very curious to hear your feedback.

Custom Choice Cereal finds it hard to believe but we’re really writing again about research on celiac disease. At least it is a good sign that the medical community has identified celiac as a serious enough topic to allocate more resources to it. While yesterday’s blog entry was about the benefits of gluten-free summer camp for celiac children, we are a little bit more practical today.

Danish researchers from the Odense University Hospital used a simple questionnaire with only 5 questions to identify children with a high likelihood of suffering from celiac disease. They were able to diagnose an additional 14 celiac children in a region that previously had only 13 known kids with celiac disease, i.e. the rate of successfully diagnosed kids more than doubled! The questions they asked were

• Has your child ever suffered from abdominal pain more than twice during the last three months?
• Has your child ever had diarrhea lasting more than two weeks?
• Does your child have a tendency to firm and hard stools?
• Does your child gain enough weight?
• Does your child gain enough height?

You can also read the article on this research directly at WebMD’s Celiac Disease Health Center.

Custom Choice Cereal is very happy to host the second Q&A session with Dr. Stephen Wangen today.

Dr. Wangen is also known as The Gluten Free Doctor, co-founded the Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) Treatment Center in Seattle, WA, and wrote the book “Healthier Without Wheat”. He is specializes in digestive disorders and food allergies and can answer all your questions on celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy, and their respective symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment.

Here is how it works in three easy steps:

• Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
• Dr. Wangen will answer your question and post it as a reply
• You read the answer. Simple enough

We are expecting great questions from you and hope we can learn in the process as well, so please don’t hold back!

You know how it is: you here about something once and within the next couple of days or weeks, the same thing gets mentioned again and again. This is what happened to Custom Choice Cereal about a summer camp that has a gluten-free week every year. Having been a counselor in a YMCA summer camp in Massachusetts himself in 2001, Hajo had to write about this.

Camp Kanata is located here in North Carolina and is run by the YMCA of the Triangle. Their gluten-free week this year is from June 27 to July 3, and we’ve been told that this week is usually fully booked by the end of February, so you should act quickly.

All meals during gluten-free week are safe to eat for kids with celiac disease or gluten intolerance, which allows them to feel normal and lets them enjoy daily camp life with other campers without worries about their diet. We believe it is a great opportunity that you should definitely consider if your child eats gluten-free.