Autoimmune Diseases – Misguided Attacks Of Our Defence System
One revelation of modern immune research was the discovery of a connection among several chronic diseases – including lupus, multiple sclerosis and others – previously thought o be unrelated. Although the conditions involve many different organs and tissues, it became clear that they share a bond: in each case, the body makes antibodies and / or T-cells that are directed against its own tissues.
This immune-system disaster typically ravages the body in three main ways:
1. As a direct attack on an organ, such as the skin (which occurs in psoriasis, for example);
2. As a domino effect – for instance, when lupus causes inflammation in the kidneys that leads directly to kidney damage; and
3. As a response that starts in one spot, then spreads. The swellings of rheumatoid arthritis affects joints first but can move on to involve other tissues.
What allows the immune system to run amok in this way is quite a mystery. It seems that many factors from viruses, to certain drugs, to sunlight – may play a role. Heredity appears to be a strong influence, but, oddly when these disorders cluster in families, they can surface as different illnesses. A mother may have lupus; her daughter, juvenile diabetes; and her grandmother, rheumatoid arthritis. Although ‘auto-immune disease’ refers to more than 80 illnesses, only a few affect lots of people.
Among those that do are:
- Hashimoto’s thyroiditis
Continued attack by the immune system destroys the thyroid gland, an organ that helps control the body’s metabolism, leading to an underproduction of thyroid hormone. Luckily, the deficiency can be made up with medication.
- Graves’ disease
This is another auto-immune problem involving the thyroid, but this time, it has the opposite effect, with the gland producing too much of the thyroid hormone.
- Lupus
This disorder (the full name is systemic lupus erythematosus) can involve inflammation of the different tissues and organs, such as the joints, skin, kidneys and even the brain, in different people.
- Rheumatoid arthritis
This immune system attacks the tissue that lines and cushions the joints – most often in the knees, wrists and hands – causing scarring within the joint that eventually disables one in ten sufferers.
- Multiple sclerosis
A disorder in the which the immune system methodically destroys myelin, the coating that protects the nerve fibres of the eye, brain and spinal cord. For some reason, people who grow up in tropical climates are much less likely to suffer from this disease.
Women & Autoimmune Diseases
Scientists don’t know for certain why, but the vast majority of auto-immune diseases occur in women.
Below are the female to male ratios of autoimmune diseases:
- Hashimoto’s thyroiditis – 50:1
- Systemic lupus erythematosus – 9:1
- Antiphospholipid syndrome – 9:1
- Sjögren’s syndrome – 9:1
- Primary biliary cirrhosis – 9:1
- Autoimmune hepatitis – 8:1
- Graves’ disease – 7:1
- Rheumatoid arthritis – 4:1
- Scleroderma – 3:1
- Juvenile diabetes – 2:1
- Multiple scleroris – 2:1
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