ArticleBMC gastroenterology2021
Is mass screening for coeliac disease a wise use of resources? A health economic evaluation.
Article in BMC gastroenterology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 23 citations in OpenAlex.
- Mass Screening Strategies for Celiac Disease in Apparently Healthy Children and Adolescents: A Systematic Review.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2026Pooled it
- Defining the optimum strategy for identifying adults and children with coeliac disease: systematic review and economic modelling.Health technology assessment (Winchester, England) · 2022Pooled it
- Challenges in the Pediatric Celiac Disease Diagnosis: An Up-to-Date Review.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Celiac disease screening in children: evaluating the evidence, benefits, and challenges.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2025Review
- Article
- Population level screening for celiac disease: is now the time?Current opinion in gastroenterology · 2023Review
- Population-Based Screening for Coeliac Disease in Lithuanian Children from 2009 to 2014.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2023Article
- Coeliac Disease Case-Control Study: Has the Time Come to Explore beyond Patients at Risk?Nutrients · 2023Article
- Five-year follow-up of new cases after a coeliac disease mass screening.Archives of disease in childhood · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
9 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundLiving with undiagnosed symptomatic coeliac disease is connected with deteriorated health, and persons with coeliac disease often wait a long time for their diagnosis. A mass screening would lower the delay, but its cost-effectiveness is still unclear. Our aim was to determine the cost-effectiveness of a coeliac disease mass screening at 12 years of age, taking a life course perspective on future benefits and drawbacks.
methodsThe cost-effectiveness was derived as cost per quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) using a Markov model. As a basis for our assumptions, we mainly used information from the Exploring the Iceberg of Celiacs in Sweden (ETICS) study, a school-based screening conducted in 2005/2006 and 2009/2010, where 13,279 12-year-old children participated and 240 were diagnosed with coeliac disease, and a study involving members of the Swedish Coeliac Association with 1031 adult participants.
resultsThe cost for coeliac disease screening was 40,105 Euro per gained QALY. Sensitivity analyses support screening based on high compliance to a gluten-free diet, rapid progression from symptom-free coeliac disease to coeliac disease with symptoms, long delay from celiac disease with symptoms to diagnosis, and a low QALY score for undiagnosed coeliac disease cases.
conclusionsA coeliac disease mass screening is cost-effective based on the commonly used threshold of 50,000 Euro per gained QALY. However, this is based on many assumptions, especially regarding the natural history of coeliac disease and the effects on long-term health for individuals with coeliac disease still eating gluten.
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