ABSTRACT
Background and Objective: studies about the prevalence of Celiac disease [CD] in western Asian countries are scarce and there is only one study on the prevalence of CD in healthy blood donors in Iran. The aim of this study is to determine the prevalence of CD in general population of the city of Sari in north of Iran
Materials and Methods: this was a descriptive study and the blood samples were obtained from 1438 person from general population [686 males, 752 females: Mean age 35.5 range 18-66 year] of the Sari which were selected by stratified randomized sampling method during 2003. Total serum IgA was measured in all and IgA-deficient cases were excluded. From this study all cases were analyzed for IgA tissue transglutaminase antibody [Human recombinant tTG]. All persons who had a positive serology for tTG-Ab underwent small intestinal biopsy. The biopsy samples were classified according to modified Marsh criteria
Results: all of the samples had normal total IgA. 13 cases showed positive IgA-tTG Ab [6 males and 7 females, mean age 37.5 yrs]. All subjects with positive serology except one of them were found to have small bowel biopsies compatible with gluten sensitive enteropathy. One of 13 had Marsh 0, 8/13 Marsh I, 3/13 Marsh II and 1/13 showed Marsh IIIa lesion
Conclusion: the minimum prevalence of gluten-sensitivity among general population in north of Iran is 1/120. This data confirms our study on healthy blood donors, which has published previously and is like of prevalence of Celiac disease in western countries. So Celiac disease is not a rare disease as it thought before in this area