Autoimmune Diseases

An autoimmune disease occurs when your body’s immune system cannot tell the difference between your own cells and foreign cells. As a result your body’s immune system attacks its own cells and tissues. There are over 80 different autoimmune diseases that can affect various parts of your body, cause inflammation (swelling and pain), damage organs, and even become life-threatening.

Autoimmune diseases are becoming more common, and impact up to 50 million people in the U.S. – making them the third most common type of disease after cancer and heart disease. Nearly 80% of people with chronic autoimmune conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, scleroderma, lupus, and Sjögren’s syndrome, are women. Additionally, in the United States, Black people, especially Black women, have a greater risk of developing diseases like systemic lupus erythematosus (lupus or SLE) and scleroderma compared to White people. Moreover, the age at which these diseases are diagnosed is about seven years younger in Black patients than in White patients.

It is not clear why Black women are more at risk from autoimmune diseases, however, genes, genetic factors, infections, and exposure to things in the environment are thought to play a large part in the likelihood of developing an autoimmune disease.

Scientists studying why women in general are more at risk for these diseases are looking at whether interactions between higher hormone levels in women, especially in the years during which they can have children, increased women’s chances of developing disease.

Common autoimmune diseases in women include:

Lupus, a disease that damages areas of the body that include joints, skin and organs
Type 1 diabetes, a condition in which the immune system damages the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas
Rheumatoid arthritis, a form of arthritis that attacks the joints
Psoriasis, a condition marked by thick, scaly patches of skin
Psoriatic arthritis, a type of arthritis affecting some people with psoriasis
Thyroid diseases, including Graves’ disease, where the body makes too much thyroid hormone (hyperthyroidism), and Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, where it doesn’t make enough (hypothyroidism) of the hormone

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