Fight with Lupus!

October 5, 2020

October is Lupus awareness month in UK. What do you know about Lupus though? Have you ever had anyone living with this disease around you? If so, this article will help you understand their situation better, and if not, you will be prepared in case of running into someone with lupus. No matter who, it always feel good to be supportive of someone and help them cope with their life path.

 

What is Lupus?

Lupus is a chronic autoimmune disease. When we are talking about an autoimmune disease, it means that our immune system have recognized body’s own cells as foreign attackers. As a result the immune cells will start fighting with a non-existing enemy, which is different organ’s normal tissue! Therefore these organs will not be able to function properly and will be damaged.

Based on the attacked organ, different types of autoimmune diseases rise. For example in Lupus, skin, joints, internal organs like kidneys and heart, and neural tissues will be affected.

Signs and symptoms:

Based on the affected organ and the stage of the disease, different signs and symptoms can be seen in Lupus patients:

  • General symptoms: chronic extreme fatigue, headaches, low fevers, loss of appetite and weight change.
  • Skin and hair symptoms: A rash called butterfly rash on the cheeks and nose. Sores and scars in mouth or nose mucosa. Patients with Lupus may suffer from a phenomenon called Reynaud. In this type of skin and microvascular involvement, in a situation of stress or coldness, toes and fingers will become pale and numb. Skin involvements are triggered by the light, mostly sunlight exposure. Hair loss is one of the other symptoms which is commonly seen.
  • Eye involvement: eyes may become dry, sensitive to light and blindness may happen in some patients.
  • Joints muscles involvement: This disease causes inflammation in joints and muscles. The latter will lead to muscle pain and weakness plus joints swelling and pain.
  • Heart and lungs: time to time chest pain and difficulty breathing or painful breathing are some of the symptoms which occur in respiratory and cardiovascular involvement.
  • Neurological involvement: seizure, confusion, headaches, numbness and weakness along with psychological involvement and memory problems may occur.
  • Kidneys involvement: kidneys will start to get hypoactive with the disease progression. Swelling of extremities, high blood pressure and urine abnormalities are some of the signs of kidney involvement.

 

It is important to be aware of these symptoms to recognize them once they attack. Another issue to consider is that these symptoms have to be present for at least three weeks in order to be considered as Lupus symptom or sign.

 

Anaemia in Lupus:

18 to 80 percent of patients suffering from Lupus, will experience anaemia during their lifetime. There are various reasons which may be the cause of low red blood cells in these patients. However, among all the reasons, anaemia of chronic disease (ACD) is the most common. ACD happens due to inflammation and extra activation of the immune system.

Iron deficiency is another cause of anaemia in this disease. As mentioned before, chronic fatigue is one of the symptoms of Lupus. Although it is expected that by starting the treatment fatigue relieves, researches have shown that many patients who are going through treatment or even they are in regression of the illness, are still complaining about it. By monitoring these patients, it has been found that in most of them the reason of fatigue is iron deficiency. Iron deficiency in these patients can be due to poor nutritional habits, blood loss, medications and the disease itself.

To beat the iron deficiency, it is important to remember that the source of iron deficiency must be found and taken care of. Oral iron supplementation is almost always effective. The supplementation can be based on ferrous sulfate, ferrous gluconate or the new innovative ferric pyrophosphate coated in phospholipid bilayer. This amazing technology has advantages that makes it the best composition for treating iron deficiency in inflammation. The unique absorption of this composition beats the mechanism which decreases the iron absorption and circulation in blood and bone marrow.

Irofix, microencapsulated iron supplement, will help you with the iron deficiency part of the disease. Remember no matter if your Lupus is in its active phase or not, it is always helpful to take iron supplements.

 

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