Your Health: Would you like to go gluten-free?

Gluten got you?

Would you like to go gluten-free?

Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye, and used to thicken everything from ketchup to ice cream. Increasingly, some people seem to be having problems digesting it.

The Harvard Medical School says some people have celiac disease, which damages the intestine and is caused by gluten, while others simply seem unable to digest gluten properly. The symptoms of both are often similar: bloating, flatulence, and diarrhea.

Eating gluten-free has become something of a dietary fad, but if you suspect you have gluten intolerance, talk to a doctor about it.

The Harvard Medical School offers a couple of cautions for those trying to get the gluten out of their diets:

Traditionally, a gluten-free diet depends on starches like rice, corn and potatoes. But that can leave out some fiber and important nutrients like B vitamins. So dietitians suggest trying alternative grains like buckwheat (which is not related to wheat), amaranth, millet, quinoa and sorghum.

Indian, Mexican and Thai cuisines might be easier on the gut for people with problems digesting gluten.

Fast asleep

It stands to reason that children who are more physically active fall asleep faster at night.

Now, researchers have quantified the benefit, after studying more than 500 7-year-olds in New Zealand.

The kids wore motion detectors around their waist for 24 hours to measure physical activity in the day and sleep at night.

Overall, the more activity they had, the faster they fell asleep. And for each hour spent sitting around during the day, it took three minutes longer to fall asleep at night.

The researchers, in Archives of Disease in Childhood, say the findings show "the importance of physical activity for children, not only for fitness, cardiovascular health and weight control, but also for promoting good sleep."

Sinus remedy

It's been open for debate, but now doctors have some evidence to rely on: Antibiotics do seem to help children with sinusitis.

Researchers writing in Journal Watch Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine ran a trial of 56 children, ages 1 to 10, diagnosed with sinusitis.

Sinusitis was defined as symptoms of nasal discharge and coughing for at least 10 days, worsening symptoms on or after the sixth day, or severe symptoms, with 102-degree temperature and discharge for at least three straight days.

Of 2,135 children assessed with upper respiratory infections, children who got antibiotics were cured 50 percent of the time, compared to 14 percent of those who did not.

But side effects like diarrhea were more common, by 44 percent compared to 14 percent, in those getting antibiotics.

Habla lupus?

A Spanish-language educational seminar about lupus will be offered next month.

Lupus is a chronic disease in which the immune system attack the body's organs. It affects 65,000 people in Illinois - 90 percent of them women - and minorities are two to three times more likely to have it.

The Illinois chapter of the nonprofit Lupus Foundation of America will hold the seminar from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 22, at the Association House of Chicago, 1116 N. Kedzie, in Chicago.

To register, call (800) 258-7872 or e-mail sonya@lupusil.org.