Celiac disease is more common than previously thought, say experts. One out of every 133 Americans has the life-long autoimmune disease, which is caused by an intolerance to gluten, a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye. The National Foundation for Celiac Disease estimates that 95 percent of people with the disease are undiagnosed.

Celiac causes inflammation in the small intestine, and eating even a small amount of gluten triggers severe diarrhea and other symptoms such as weight loss, osteoporosis, seizures, migraines, miscarriages, and fatigue. Celiac can even lead to cancer.

Experts estimate celiac can cause more than 250 symptoms. Avoiding gluten can alleviate the symptoms, but even tiny amounts can cause severe reactions.

Not only is there no cure for celiac disease, there are no treatments, mainly because for many years the condition was thought to be rare and mainly confined to children. But as the number of people diagnosed with celiac continues to rise, drug companies are rushing to develop treatments.

No drugs are expected to be approved until at least 2018, but early trials have been hopeful, and a couple of prospective treatments may progress to final testing.

Most of the drugs in development will not allow people to eat normal amounts of wheat and other foods containing gluten, but they will help ease symptoms when a small amount of gluten is present in the food and gets into the intestine.

In the main, mostly small companies are developing the drugs, although large pharmaceutical companies are showing interest. One drug, Alvine's ALV003, contains two enzymes that break down gluten, the trigger for celiac, before it reaches the small intestine. It is a powder that would be dissolved in water and taken before meals.

A phase 2 randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study found that ALV003 protected the intestines of celiac patients from becoming inflamed. Results of a larger trial are expected in the fall.

Another company, ImmusanT, hopes to eliminate the need for a gluten-free diet by injecting patients with gluten that stimulates an immune reaction that will cause the body to become tolerant to gluten, similar to allergy shots. Laboratory studies have shown that the drug Nexcax2 is capable of causing tolerance to gluten, and the drug is now in clinical trials.

A recent workshop sponsored by the FDA discussed that evaluating the effectiveness of new drugs would be difficult because of the wide range of symptoms. And if the drugs are approved, experts wonder if they would be so expensive that insurance companies would limit coverage to those who have a definite diagnosis of celiac disease determined by a biopsy rather than the simple blood test used today, and refuse to cover patients who only have gluten sensitivity.