Common among women of reproductive age-group, AIIMS warns of rising prevalence of autoimmune disease

The All India Institute of Medical Sciences on Wednesday flagged concern over a spurt in non-communicable diseases like auto-immune disease due to lifestyle factors especially chronic stress and obesity besides food pattern, sleeping habits, smoking and tobacco consumption among others.

The globally-rated medical research institution underscored that genetic factors contribute 30 to 40 percent and environmental causes account for 60 to 70 percent for inducing the disease. Environmental factors like pesticides and air pollution are also the reasons for such diseases.

Autoimmune diseases are also aggravated during the winter as symptoms are more pronounced due to cold and reduced atmospheric pressure.  “Our tissues in the body also carry pressure inside. When there is less atmospheric pressure outside, but internal pressure is more and the tissue expands resulting into the stiffness and pains into the joints,” said Dr Uma Kumar, Head of the Rheumatology Department at AIIMS.

Autoimmune disease is a condition in which the immune system of the afflicted person mistakenly damages healthy cells in the individual’s own body. It is also a non-communicable diseases.

It highlighted that the infection-related disease are under control but the non-communicable diseases are on the upswing due to lack of awareness.

“Because of several reasons, such diseases are on the rising trends in today’s world among population. This is ignored area because of unawareness on large scale,” Dr Kumar said.  

Stressing that Vitamin D deficiency is also a contributing factor for autoimmune disease, she said autoimmune disease can appear in any age group but it is more common in the reproductive age group. Dr Kumar also said autoimmune diseases are more common among women and is linked to sex hormones as especially estrogen promotes immune activity. Secondly, the X chromosome carries many immune-related genes, giving females a potential predisposition.

“Women’ problem do not confine with the reproductive health only, but this problem also affects their health and lives. As these diseases are more common in women, it may be one of the reasons that it has been ignored”, said Dr Kumar.

Dr Kumar also underlined the role of the “hygiene hypothesis” as an underlying cause for such diseases. The hypothesis suggests reduced exposure to microbes – germs, infections, parasites – in early childhood due to hyper cleanliness environment especially at home results in reduced tolerance due to non-exposure to pathogens.  It proposes that early microbial exposure “trains” the immune system to distinguish between threats and benign elements.

Earlier, children used to be more exposed to microorganism in environment which resulted into the tolerance development of the body. But in modern times, children are not exposed so much to microorganism leading minimal development of tolerance into the body. When such children with reduced immunity are exposed to microbes, their  bodies react strongly, hiking the chances of auto-immune disesases.

Autoimmune diseases can be classified as either organ-specific or systemic – non-organ-specific -, depending on whether they target a single organ or affect multiple organs and systems throughout the body.

Dispelling the misconception about the disease, she added that these diseases are neither hereditary nor contagious.