Clinical Manifestations, Causes and Treatments for Lupus Research Paper

Clinical Manifestations, Causes and Treatments for Lupus - Research Paper Example There are a number of variations of lupus, with the most common being systemic lupus erythematosus which affects the entire body. The causes of lupus are not fully known, although stress has been shown to play a role in the appearance of symptoms, and the presence of the disease itself is thought to be genetically linked. There is no known cure for the disease, although medication and treatment can help to alleviate some of the symptoms. Nevertheless, lupus sufferers can often lead relatively normal lives, and more than 80 percent survive the first ten years after diagnosis. Thesis statement Lupus is an autoimmune disease that affects a large number of systems and is difficult to diagnose. However, despite the fact that there is no known cure for the disease, treatments are available, and most people can live normal lives. Introduction The name lupus is from the Latin word for wolf due to the appearance of a facial rash which was thought to resemble the bite of a wolf . However, not all suffers get the rash, and it is not always severe . Lupus is an autoimmune disease, which results in the body perceiving its own tissues as invaders and raising an immune response against it. The disease can be present in several different body systems and substantially ranges in severity. Some cases of the disease are life threatening, while others can be trivial and little to no effect on daily activity. The result of this is that the disease can be extremely difficult to diagnosis . The primary means of diagnosing lupus is through the use of an anti-nuclear antibody test (ANA). However, this is not fully reliable, as many people have positive ANA results that do not have lupus, and some forms of lupus do not trigger a positive ANA result. For example, although many people are diagnosed with lupus through blood screening, only around ten percent of these actually have the disease . Consequently, a range of methods are used for diagnosis, and patients are often misdiagnosed man y times before being correctly diagnosed with lupus. Lupus varies in intensity, it can flare up with stronger symptoms for a time, and it can go into remission for many years at a time. The exact causes of flares or remission are unknown, but research suggests that stress is a likely driver of the severity of the symptoms . One of the most recognizable aspects of lupus is the red rash that many patients get. In many cases when the rash heals, there is no trace of it remaining . While most lupus sufferers have systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), there are other variations of the disease. Types of Lupus Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) can affect all or most of the body, including the blood, joints, skin and often kidneys . The term â€Å"systemic† refers to all over, while erythematosus means red. This can affect any part of the body . The disease acts by the presence of antibodies in the bloodstream that attack components of the hosts system. Wherever these land, they cause inflammation and often pain. Symptoms vary substantially depending on where the antibodies are present. For example, some lupus patients have general aches, severe pain in their joints, a skin rash or an unusual blood count . SLE is the most common form of the disease, and this type is most often associated with the term lupus . For a person to be officially diagnosed with lupus (SLE variant), the disease must conform to four of 11 criteria. The criteria are broken down into three sections, the