Acute abdominal complications of coeliac disease

Two rare complications of coeliac disease are described in patients who presented as acute abdominal emergencies. One of the patients had both oesophageal and small intestinal obstruction produced by an ulcerative process involving these portions of the gastro-intestinal tract. The other, a patient with long standing dermatitis herpetiformis, perforated his small intestine at a site involved by both a lymphoma and partial villous atrophy.