Most people have heard of Lupus but don't really know what it is. Here is a simple way to describe lupus.
Lupus is an autoimmune disease in which the immune system attacks healthy organs in the body as if they were an infectious agent, such as a virus or bacterium. This is a basic definition of lupus erythematosus known as SLE. There are various types of lupus, but this is what is most generally referred to by people as lupus.
Systemic inflammation can wreak havoc in any part of your body. Dr. Floyd Chilton of Wake Forest Baptist Health School of Medicine in North Carolina says, and I quote here, "If the haywire inflammatory process happens in the heart, you wind up with heart disease; if it happens in the joints, it's arthritis; in the brain, it might be dementia." Widespread inflammation can be a symptom of lupus, an autoimmune, chronic inflammatory condition. It is also widely believed by the medical community that chronic inflammation plays a significant role (either as a cause or effect) in many diseases such as type 2 diabetes, arthritis, Chron's disease, heart disease, cancer, and stroke. The last three are America's top 3 killers.
