Editorial
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Aug 21, 2015; 21(31): 9233-9238
Published online Aug 21, 2015. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v21.i31.9233
Iron deficiency anemia in celiac disease
Hugh James Freeman
Hugh James Freeman, Department of Medicine (Gastroenterology), University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC V6T 1W5, Canada
Author contributions: Freeman HJ contributed all to this paper.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Freeman HJ declares no conflict of interest related to this publication.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Hugh James Freeman, MD, CM, FRCPC, FACP, Professor, Department of Medicine (Gastroenterology), University of British Columbia, UBC Hospital, 2211 Wesbrook Mall, Vancouver, BC V6T 1W5, Canada. hugfree@shaw.ca
Telephone: +1-604-8227216
Received: December 24, 2014
Peer-review started: December 25, 2014
First decision: March 10, 2015
Revised: March 30, 2015
Accepted: June 16, 2015
Article in press: June 16, 2015
Published online: August 21, 2015
Core Tip

Core tip: Iron is a critical micronutrient that may be deficient in well-established celiac disease or be the presenting clinical feature even in the absence of diarrhea or weight loss. Most often, impaired duodenal mucosal uptake of iron is evident since surface absorptive area in the duodenum in reduced, in large part, because celiac disease is an immune-mediated disorder largely focused in the proximal small intestine. Other superimposed small intestinal complications of celiac disease may be responsible causing blood loss, including ulceration or neoplasia. Finally, associated gastric or colonic causes of blood loss, immune-mediated hemolysis and reduced expression of different regulatory proteins critical in iron uptake may be present.