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Concept
Autoimmunity
Summary
In immunology, autoimmunity is the system of immune responses of an organism against its own healthy cells, tissues and other normal body constituents. Any disease resulting from this type of immune response is termed an "autoimmune disease". Prominent examples include celiac disease, post-infectious IBS, diabetes mellitus type 1, Henoch–Schönlein purpura (HSP) sarcoidosis, systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), Sjögren syndrome, eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis, Hashimoto's thyroiditis, Graves' disease, idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, Addison's disease, rheumatoid arthritis (RA), ankylosing spondylitis, polymyositis (PM), dermatomyositis (DM), and multiple sclerosis (MS). Autoimmune diseases are very often treated with steroids.
Autoimmunity means presence of antibodies or T cells that react with self-protein and is present in all individuals, even in normal health state. It causes autoimmune diseases if self-reactivity can lead to tissue damage.
In the later 19th century it was believed that the immune system was unable to react against the body's own tissues. Paul Ehrlich, at the turn of the 20th century, proposed the concept of horror autotoxicus. Ehrlich later adjusted his theory to recognize the possibility of autoimmune tissue attacks, but believed certain innate protection mechanisms would prevent the autoimmune response from becoming pathological.
In 1904 this theory was challenged by the discovery of a substance in the serum of patients with paroxysmal cold hemoglobinuria that reacted with red blood cells. During the following decades, a number of conditions could be linked to autoimmune responses. However, the authoritative status of Ehrlich's postulate hampered the understanding of these findings. Immunology became a biochemical rather than a clinical discipline. By the 1950s the modern understanding of autoantibodies and autoimmune diseases started to spread.
More recently it has become accepted that autoimmune responses are an integral part of vertebrate immune systems (sometimes termed "natural autoimmunity").
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