Dear all,
I am new in this forum and I have some questions about LC.
One and a half years ago I had a virus infection after which I had the following symptoms every two weeks:
- a kind of anxiety followed by anorexia, low fever, fatigue, itchy skin and several stools of semi-diarrhea per day
6 months after I got diagnosed with LC (one year ago). My doctor said the symptoms did not fit with LC (specially low fever and lack of liquid diarrea). However se treated me for three months with budesonida. Two months after treatment I felt better, still with episodes but symptoms were less severe (and fever was gone). She never told me to change my diet, so I didn't.
Two weeks after budesonida treatment I had a strong episode again, but I recovered faster than before treatment, and following weeks episodes kept softer.
Then I found this nice forum and MC Foundation website and I started a gluten-free diet as suggested. Two months after I felt pretty well, with very soft episodes, and finally having a kind of normal life!! However, two weeks ago I ate some pasta, and ten days later I had a new strong episode, similar to the ones before budesonida treatment.
My questions:
- are my symptoms characteristic of LC? Specially low fever...
- is it possible that the reaction against gluten appears 10 days later?
- I am very interested in EnteroLab's Food Sensitivity Testing from stools, but I am from Barcelona (Spain). Do you know if it is possible to send samples from Europe to EnteroLab? If not, do you know of any other company performing these tests in Eurpo?
Thanks for your help!!! It really helps reading posts from people suffering the same problem I do!!
Newbie with some questions
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Newbie with some questions
Jordi Argilaguet
Barcelona
Spain
Barcelona
Spain
Hello Jordi,
Welcome to the forum. I'll try to answer your questions to the best of my knowledge. No, your symptoms are not all typical of LC, but an incorrect diagnosis of LC is almost impossible. An LC diagnosis is often overlooked, but LC is virtually never incorrectly diagnosed. So it is very, very likely that you do have LC, despite atypical symptoms. Some of the rest of us have atypical symptoms.
Interestingly, your initial symptoms were an almost exact match for mine when I experienced a severe magnesium deficiency a few years ago. I was already taking a magnesium supplement, but not enough, and an antibiotic treatment depleted my magnesium reserves. The sudden anxiety was a key symptom, and I had low grade fever. It got so bad that I couldn't eat breakfast one day so I went to the emergency room. They could not diagnose my problem, but when I looked at my test results the next day, I noticed that low magnesium was flagged. So I tripled my magnesium supplement and within a day or two I felt fine.
Magnesium deficiency is associated with almost all diseases, and all inflammatory bowel diseases and many medications (including corticosteroids) deplete magnesium.
I sometimes had fever when I was reacting, but I suspect that the fever was associated with diverticulitis. The lymphocytic infiltration that is characteristic of LC, is also present with diverticulitis.
The pasta may have been cross-contaminated with gluten, or something else may have been the cause of the recent reaction. Gluten normally causes a reaction within 3–6 hours, but in some cases the reaction may occur up to a day later.
Yes, you should be able to get a stool test kit from EnteroLab in Spain. If you will phone or email the lab, they will give you the information you need in order to receive the collection kit and send back the sample. As far as I am aware, EnteroLab is the only lab in the world that can provide accurate and reliable results for food sensitivities that are associated with LC.
Again, welcome aboard, and please feel free to ask anything.
Tex
Welcome to the forum. I'll try to answer your questions to the best of my knowledge. No, your symptoms are not all typical of LC, but an incorrect diagnosis of LC is almost impossible. An LC diagnosis is often overlooked, but LC is virtually never incorrectly diagnosed. So it is very, very likely that you do have LC, despite atypical symptoms. Some of the rest of us have atypical symptoms.
Interestingly, your initial symptoms were an almost exact match for mine when I experienced a severe magnesium deficiency a few years ago. I was already taking a magnesium supplement, but not enough, and an antibiotic treatment depleted my magnesium reserves. The sudden anxiety was a key symptom, and I had low grade fever. It got so bad that I couldn't eat breakfast one day so I went to the emergency room. They could not diagnose my problem, but when I looked at my test results the next day, I noticed that low magnesium was flagged. So I tripled my magnesium supplement and within a day or two I felt fine.
Magnesium deficiency is associated with almost all diseases, and all inflammatory bowel diseases and many medications (including corticosteroids) deplete magnesium.
I sometimes had fever when I was reacting, but I suspect that the fever was associated with diverticulitis. The lymphocytic infiltration that is characteristic of LC, is also present with diverticulitis.
The pasta may have been cross-contaminated with gluten, or something else may have been the cause of the recent reaction. Gluten normally causes a reaction within 3–6 hours, but in some cases the reaction may occur up to a day later.
Yes, you should be able to get a stool test kit from EnteroLab in Spain. If you will phone or email the lab, they will give you the information you need in order to receive the collection kit and send back the sample. As far as I am aware, EnteroLab is the only lab in the world that can provide accurate and reliable results for food sensitivities that are associated with LC.
Again, welcome aboard, and please feel free to ask anything.
Tex
It is suspected that some of the hardest material known to science can be found in the skulls of GI specialists who insist that diet has nothing to do with the treatment of microscopic colitis.