Autoimmune diseases

Autoimmune diseases are a category of medical conditions in which your immune system, which is designed to protect against harmful invaders such as bacteria and viruses, mistakenly attacks your own healthy cells and tissues.

In a healthy immune system, specialized cells and proteins work together to recognize foreign substances and mount a defense against them. However, in autoimmune diseases, this system becomes dysregulated, leading to a loss of self-tolerance, where the immune system cannot distinguish between “self” and “non-self.”

This confusion causes your immune system to produce antibodies and immune cells that target and damage healthy tissues and organs, often resulting in inflammation, pain, and dysfunction.

Autoimmune diseases can affect virtually any part of your body, leading to a wide range of symptoms and complications.

You can go your entire life with the early symptoms of autoimmunity — including joint pain, weight gain, brain fog, intestinal imbalances, depression, mood disorders, and fatigue — without ever receiving a diagnosis of the disease. If a diagnosis is made, unfortunately, it is usually after significant tissue damage has already occurred.

Autoimmunity occurs on a spectrum and develops slowly, often almost imperceptibly, over time. This spectrum can be measured by the level of antibodies. Whether you have noticeable symptoms or not, if you have elevated antibodies, you are experiencing tissue degeneration.

Ignoring or suppressing symptoms only allows the underlying imbalance to continue causing further tissue damage.

THE DIFFERENT AUTOIMMUNE DISEASES

Did you know that there are over 80 autoimmune diseases and many other autoimmune conditions? In addition, if you are on the autoimmune spectrum, you likely have more than one condition. Some of the most common autoimmune diseases include:

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) — chronic inflammation of the joints that causes swelling, pain, and stiffness.

Lupus — a chronic, autoimmune disease that affects many different body systems — including the joints, skin, kidneys, blood cells, brain, heart, and lungs.

Vitiligo — a condition in which the skin loses its pigment cells, resulting in discolored patches on different areas of the body, including the skin, hair, and mucous membranes.

Psoriasis — a skin condition that causes red, scaly, crusty patches that typically appear on the elbows, knees, and lower back, but can occur anywhere on the body.

Celiac disease — an allergic reaction to gluten that causes inflammation and damage to the small intestine and leads to malabsorption of nutrients.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) — a disease of the brain and spinal cord that can cause problems with vision, balance, memory, and muscle control.

Pernicious anemia — a condition in which there is a decrease in red blood cells that occurs when the intestines cannot properly absorb vitamin B12.

Hashimoto's disease — an autoimmune disorder that can cause hypothyroidism, or an underactive thyroid.

Graves' disease — an immune system disorder that results in the overproduction of thyroid hormones (hyperthyroidism).

Inflammatory Bowel Disease — a generic term used to describe disorders involving chronic inflammation of your digestive tract, Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis.

Addison’s disease — when your adrenal glands don’t produce enough hormones, leading to symptoms such as fatigue, nausea and weight loss.

Sjögren’s syndrome — a chronic autoimmune disease that affects the body’s moisture-producing glands (lacrimal and salivary glands) and often seriously affects other organ systems, such as the lungs, kidneys and nervous system.

Type 1 diabetes — a condition in which your immune system destroys insulin-producing cells in your pancreas (beta cells).

WHAT CAUSES AUTOIMMUNE DISEASE?

Autoimmune disease develops from damage caused by excessive inflammation.

Inflammation is your immune system’s natural response to an invader. However, if this inflammation is self-perpetuating and becomes chronic, it can lead to autoimmunity.

For inflammation to continue in a chronic state and cause autoimmunity, three distinct factors must be present:

-Genetic susceptibility

-Environmental triggers

-Leaky gut

 

Genetic susceptibility

Your genetic code affects your health in many different ways. If you are genetically predisposed to a particular autoimmune disease, you are vulnerable to developing high levels of antibodies to that tissue or organ.

However, there must be an environmental trigger to activate the gene, as well as a loss of intestinal barrier function, also known as leaky gut.

Without these two modulators, you are unlikely to develop autoimmunity, even though it is part of your genetic code.

 

Environmental Triggers

An environmental trigger is the straw that breaks the camel’s back. Some common environmental triggers include food sensitivities, infections (e.g., yeast, viruses, bacteria, Lyme), sugar, mold, pesticides, preservatives or additives, heavy metals, and other environmental toxins.

Like food allergies, food sensitivities also cause inflammation. Unlike food allergies, food sensitivities are often marked by a delayed reaction: your body may not respond to the problematic food for up to 72 hours after the food is consumed. Gluten, dairy, and eggs are generally the most common food sensitivities, although you can develop a food sensitivity to almost any type of food.

The longer you go without recognizing a food sensitivity and the longer you continue to eat these foods, the more likely you are to develop an autoimmune disease due to the excessive inflammation and tissue damage it causes. However, once the offending food is identified and avoided, your immune system can begin to recover, and your body can begin to heal.

 Leaky Gut

The lining of your gut acts like a sieve: only small molecules should pass into your bloodstream. However, if you have a leaky gut, larger molecules such as food proteins, toxins and bacteria can pass through the “sieve” and enter your bloodstream, triggering an immune response and the creation of antibodies. Every time your body is exposed to an invader, your immune system remembers its structure so that it can recognize it in the future and develop an appropriate defense against it.

However, certain food proteins, such as gluten, eggs and dairy, are structurally similar to many of your own body’s tissues. Your immune system then registers it as an invader and attacks your own tissue.

        For example, in people with autoimmune thyroid disease, every time they eat gluten, the immune system sends out antibodies to detect and destroy gluten. However, due to the similarity in structure, some of these immune cells end up attacking the thyroid by mistake. This phenomenon is known as molecular mimicry.