The mouth—an accessible region for gluten challenge
The advent of jejunal biopsy techniques in the early 1960s revolutionized the diagnosis, treatment and understanding of gluten-sensitive enteropathy (coeliac disease). Prior to this, the diagnosis was confirmed by the measurement of faecal fats as an indicator of malabsorption. This is a non-specific test which did not distinguish other forms of fat malabsorption, which might also include anything which interferes with pancreatic function, e.g. cystic fibrosis [1].