Autoimmune Diseases Information
Our bodies have an immune system that protects us from disease and infection. But if you have an autoimmune disease, your immune system attacks itself by mistake.
Normally the immune system's army of white blood cells helps protect the body from harmful substances, called antigens. Examples of antigens include bacteria, viruses, toxins, cancer cells, and foreign blood or tissues from another person or species. The immune system produces antibodies that destroy these harmful substances.
Autoimmune diseases arise from an overactive immune response of the body against substances and tissues normally present in the body. In other words, the body attacks its own cells. This may be restricted to certain organs (e.g. in thyroiditis) or involve a particular tissue in different places (e.g. Goodpasture's disease which may affect the basement membrane in both the lung and the kidney).
Autoimmune disorders are classified into two types, organ-specific (directed mainly at one organ) and non-organ-specific (widely spread throughout the body).
Nearly 79% of autoimmune disease patients in the USA are women. Also they tend to appear during or shortly after puberty. It is not known why this is the case, although hormone levels have been shown to affect the severity of some autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis.
The treatment of autoimmune diseases is typically with immunosuppression - medication which decreases the immune response.
There are more than 80 types of autoimmune diseases.
Examples of Autoimmune Diseases Include:
| Acute disseminated encephalomyelitis Addison's disease Alopecia areata Antiphospholipid antibody syndrome Autoimmune hemolytic anemia Autoimmune hepatitis Autoimmune inner ear disease Bullous pemphigoid Celiac disease Chagas disease Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease Crohns Disease Dermatomyositis Diabetes mellitus type 1 |
Endometriosis Goodpasture's syndrome Graves' disease Guillain-Barre syndrome Hashimoto's disease Hidradenitis suppurativa Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura Interstitial cystitis Lupus erythematosus Mixed Connective Tissue Disease Morphea Suspected Multiple sclerosis Myasthenia gravis Narcolepsy |
Neuromyotonia Pemphigus Vulgaris Pernicious anaemia Polymyositis Primary biliary cirrhosis Rheumatoid arthritis Schizophrenia Scleroderma Sjögren's syndrome Temporal arteritis Ulcerative Colitis Vasculitis Vitiligo Wegener's granulomatosis |
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