Eight-year-old Hannah Sherry from Bungalally is a happy, healthy little girl with energy to burn. She loves tap and jazz ballet, going to cubs and playing with her friends at school.

But when she was three, it was a different story. Hannah was ill and no one knew.

“When she was little, Hannah often had a bad tummy after eating pasta so we stopped giving it to her,” Hannah’s mum Jenni Sherry said.

“She was fairly slight and would often sleep for a long time at night, but I was never big as a child and I’m a good sleeper too so we never thought anything about it.

“There were no signs at all of her being unwell, so we weren’t worried about her at all.

“Then she picked up a bug and didn’t seem to get over it. Unfortunately, it developed into pneumonia and she was admitted to hospital. The blood tests they ran showed she was anaemic.

“That’s fairly unusual in a child and the doctors ran some more tests. Two weeks later we got a call from our GP to say they thought Hannah had coeliac disease.

“We were referred to a paediatrician and the diagnosis was confirmed,” Jenni said.

“We were amazed, it was like a bolt out of the blue. Apart from her tummy upsets when she ate pasta, there were no signs of it whatsoever.”

Coeliac disease is a serious condition affecting at least one in 100 children in Australia. Sadly, four out of five children with the disease are not diagnosed.

“We’re just so glad we found out that Hannah had coeliac disease when she was young so we could start her on the right treatment straight away,” Jenni said.

Paediatric gastroenterologist Associate Professor Don Cameron is an adviser to The Coeliac Research Fund and The Coeliac Society.

He said there was urgent need to raise public awareness about coeliac disease in children, because although it was common, it was often not diagnosed and could result in severe health complications in later life if it is not treated properly.

Coeliac disease is caused by a total intolerance to gluten which is found in wheat, barley, oats and rye.

“We call it ‘the hidden epidemic’ because most coeliacs are not diagnosed until they are adults and some are never diagnosed at all,” Professor Cameron said.

“But we need to put coeliac disease squarely in the public limelight because this is a very serious condition. Not only can it cause very debilitating symptoms in children and hinder their growth and development, but if it is left untreated, it can also cause early onset osteoporosis, liver disease, infertility and cancer in later life,” he said.

Professor Cameron urged parents to ring the Coeliac Awareness Hotline for more information if their child had any symptoms that might be due to coeliac disease.

Symptoms include unexplained bloating, diarrhoea or constipation, stomach pains, tiredness or lack of stamina, anaemia, mouth ulcers, failure to thrive or difficulty in concentrating.

• Coeliac Awareness Week starts on Monday.