CELIAC DISEASE AND SCREENING

Key words: Population based screening, High risk group screening

From the clinical and the epidemiological point of view, celiac disease may represent an appropriate disease model to apply a population based screening strategy. In the literature, the use of human tTG antibodies is described as an efficient screening strategy both in high risk groups and in family “case finding” series. However, population based screening is still a matter of debate, since it is yet not clear which is the most appropriate age when performing the screening and which motivations to offer to those subjects positive at the screening but still asymptomatic. It has been suggested to first identify subjects at risk by neonatal determination of HLA DQ2/DQ8 and to follow them up with periodical sierological tTG tests in order to identify early celiac patients.