Follow-up of CD Patient: Is Mucosal Recovery a Goal of Therapy?

The main aim of this chapter is to give a comprehensive guide to the follow-up of patients with CD. The compliance with a strict gluten-free diet (GFD) is the main goal in the management. Patients must be trained in the GFD and the benefits obtained from a strict adherence. There are several methods to assess the compliance of the diet and they are summarized in the text: interviews with a dietitian or a doctor, structured surveys, serology, histology and gluten detection in the feces. Furthermore, CD patients must be included into a periodical follow-up made by a physician (general or gastroenterologist) qualified on the management of CD. Periodical visits include: clinical assessment, laboratory test (detection of nutritional deficiencies and CD serology) and other test in selected cases (bone densitometry and hyposplenism detection). The evaluation of the duodenal mucosa recovery throughout the follow-up may be important identify those patients who require a closer monitoring to detect nutritional deficiencies or complications associated to the persistence of mucosal atrophy.