ROC-king onwards: intraepithelial lymphocyte counts, distribution and role in coeliac disease mucosal interpretation

Coeliac biopsies: numbers are valid, alphabets not

“…We thank Gut for requesting responses to this letter from Oberhuber and colleagues 1. We were amazed that they chose to dismiss our intraepithelial lymphocytes (IEL) data as invalid2 on grounds of not being age/gender matched with controls.…”

“…But this disregards all the other data of clinicians and pathologists in the field, and the rigorous reviewing processes that our article went through before publication in Gut . This dismissal reflects an aberrant viewpoint1 lacking widespread support. In real life, pathologists do sign off biopsies, while diagnoses are rendered without full clinical details, although with appropriately worded caveats.…”