FAQ

Do you believe there is any benefit to screening for coeliac-related genes to identify individuals who may be susceptible (e.g. in relatives of those with diagnosed coeliac disease?)

The most important coeliac genes, HLA-DQ2 and HLA-DQ8 are not very useful to diagnose people for coeliac disease, but are only used to exclude a coeliac disease diagnosis. The other genes all play a much smaller role in coeliac disease, so including these genes one by one in tests is unlikely to help in identifying susceptible people. However, genetics is moving fast and new methods are being developed that use the complete genetics of an individual to predict how much risk they have for certain diseases. This is something we are also working on and we hope that this may give us a better predictive power to see who is susceptible and who is not in the future.

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