What is lupus?
Lupus, also called systemic lupus erythematosus (sis-teh-mik lew-pus er-eh-thee-muh-toh-sis) or SLE, is a disease that affects your immune system. Normally, your immune system fights infections caused by germs. Instead of protecting your body, your immune system makes the mistake of attacking your body’s healthy cells. Lupus can affect almost any part of your body, including your joints, skin, kidneys, heart, lungs, blood vessels, and brain. There is no way to know what part of your body will be affected. For most people though, lupus is a mild disease affecting only a few parts of your body, and some patients don’t get inner organ problems (like in the heart and lungs), but do have skin and joint problems. Normally, lupus develops slowly, with symptoms that come and go. For some, it can cause serious and even life-threatening problems. Even for patients with diseases that hurt their organs, with good care and management and a strong partnership between a patient and her health care pr
Lupus is a chronic (long-lasting) autoimmune disease in which the immune system, for unknown reasons, becomes hyperactive and attacks normal tissue. This attack results in inflammation and brings about symptoms. What does autoimmune mean? Literally it means immune activity directed against the self. The immune system fights the body itself (Auto=self). In autoimmune diseases, the immune system makes a mistake and reacts to the body’s own tissues. What is inflammation? Literally it means setting on fire. It is a protective process our body uses when tissues are injured. Inflammation helps to eliminate a foreign body or organism (virus, bacteria) and prevent further injury. Signs of inflammation include; swelling, redness, pain and warmth. If the signs of inflammation are long lasting, as they can be in lupus, then damage to the tissues can occur and normal function is impaired. This is why the treatment of lupus is aimed at reducing the inflammation. What happens in autoimmune diseases
What are the types of lupus? Lupus is an autoimmune disease characterized by acute and chronic inflammation of various tissues of the body. Autoimmune diseases are illnesses that occur when the body’s tissues are attacked by its own immune system. The immune system is a complex system within the body that is designed to fight infectious agents, such as bacteria and other foreign microbes. One of the ways that the immune system fights infections is by producing antibodies that bind to the microbes. Patients with lupus produce abnormal antibodies in their blood that target tissues within their own body rather than foreign infectious agents. Because the antibodies and accompanying cells of inflammation can affect tissues anywhere in the body, lupus has the potential to affect a variety of areas. Sometimes lupus can cause disease of the skin, heart, lungs, kidneys, joints, and/or nervous system. When only the skin is involved, the condition is called lupus dermatitis or cutaneous lupus ery
