Lupus is a systematic autoimmune disease which affects the body’s tissues and organs by your own immune system thinking that they are foreign. Lupus is a chronic inflammatory disease that affects various parts of the body including joints, skin, kidneys, blood cells, brain, heart, and lungs. Lupus is also known as systemic lupus erythematosus or SLE. The exact cause of lupus is very difficult to diagnose, although it’s a combination of genes, hormones and environmental factors. It affects women between 18 and 40 years of age.

Symptoms of lupus is unpredictable, a combination of medications and lifestyle changes can make the person lead a normal life. Lupus is a chronic inflammatory disease with many health risks like cardiovascular disease, kidney disease and stroke. There is a chance of developing atherosclerosis, mayocarditis and endocarditis, which can lead to heart murmurs.

Today, doctors recognize the condition at early stages and there are many ways to manage this disease compare to earlier. Almost the success rate is more than 90%.

How immune system works:
Our immune system protects our body by producing antibodies which attack bacteria and viruses. However, people with lupus produce antibodies that attack their own tissues. These antibodies will cause pain, inflammation and also damage other parts of the body.

Causes of Lupus:
Doctors don’t know the exact reason behind lupus. They think that this autoimmune disease is caused due to genetics, hormones and environment. So if your parents have this disease, you may also likely to develop lupus. However, genes alone are not the reason to get lupus, it occurs due to many other factors which are not yet identified. Other factors which may trigger lupus are

Exposure to sunlight, which is common cause of flare-ups.
Long term medications or antibiotics may trigger lupus.
Viral infections and stress
Hormone estrogen may be a reason for lupus because 9 out of 10 are women who are affected. Men and women both make estrogen, but women make more. But this doesn’t conclude that estrogen alone causes lupus.
Symptoms :
No two people with lupus have same symptoms. The symptoms may fluctuate between active periods (flares) and then minimal for sometime (remission). The signs and symptoms of lupus include:

Sun sensitive rashes on the face especially on nose and cheeks. It is called as butterfly rash.
Joint pains, swelling, fever
The painful inflammation in the joints, sometimes mistaken as rheumatoid arthritis.
Chest pain, cough and breathing problems
Dry eyes, headache, hair loss
Fatigue and weight loss
Raynauds phenomenon- fingers or toes turn white or blue when exposed to cold.
Confusion and memory loss
Enlarged lymph nodes
Bald patches or hair loss
Recurrent miscarriages.
Complications in organs: SLE affects many organs of the body.
Joint pain and stiffness: This is an early symptom occurs almost to everyone with lupus.
Skin changes: Most of the people get butterfly rash. This lasts for few days and often comes back when exposed to sun.
Kidneys: Inflammation in kidney is common in people with lupus. Many people might not have even noticed it until the problem is advanced. Once it advances the person may have bloating, ankle swelling and damage to the glomeruli -that can prevent the kidneys from filtering waste from the bloodstream. Eventually if untreated kidney failure may happen.
Digestive system: The medications given for treating lupus may affect the digestive system. It may cause stomach pain, or sometime stomach ulcers.
Lungs: Pain with breathing and shortness of breath may occur.
Heart: A variety of symptoms may develop if lupus affects the heart or blood vessels such as chest pain with exercise, pain in the chest due to inflammation around the heart, shortness of breath due to heart valve disease.