ORLANDO, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) – Cardiovascular disease is the number one killer in people with lupus with about 50 percent of those patients having serious heart complications as a result of their disease. It’s a chronic, inflammatory autoimmune disease that mainly affects the skin, joints, kidneys and blood cells. But it can also affect the heart. Ivanhoe reports on new research that could help detect these heart problems with a simple blood test.
“I’ve noticed weight gain, fatigue, joint pain. It wasn’t until i got to the hospital that i got my diagnoses for lupus.” Says Diana Yeauger Espinoza
Younger women in their mid-thirties or forties with lupus are more than 50 times more likely to have a heart attack than women of similar age who don’t have it. And … “Lupus is much more common in women than men, about nine to one.” Says Brad H. Rovin, MD, Professor of Medicine and Pathology at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.
Researchers at the University of Houston say a comprehensive metabolic screen from the blood can identify metabolism issues that might lead to future plaque build-up in the heart.
Heart problems commonly associated with Lupus include inflammation of the sack that lines the heart, valve abnormalities, rhythm disorders, like arrhythmias, inflammation of the muscular tissue, and accelerated arterial plaque build-up.
Doctors say controlling active Lupus and preventing flare ups are the best steps in preventing and managing heart problems.
Doctor Rovin, MD, says “The quicker you can get to the patient and treat them, the more effective the medications are to decrease the inflammation, turn off the inflammatory systems.”
Early identification in these high-risk Lupus patients can launch preventive measures during the early stages of the disease.
Most heart complications can be detected by a simple electrocardiograph, or EKG, standard chest x-ray, echocardiograph, doppler investigation, or lab tests.
Mild heart conditions in Lupus patients can be treated with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, NSAIDs, like ibuprofen and naproxen or corticosteroids to decrease pain and inflammation.
Contributors to this news report include: Leslie Hudson, Producer; Roque Correa, Editor.
Sources:
https://www.hopkinslupus.org/lupus-info/lupus-affects-body/lupus-cardiovascular-system/
https://www.hss.edu/conditions_top-ten-series-lupus-heart-conditions.asp
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/06/220602121433.htm
https://www.hss.edu/conditions_top-ten-series-lupus-heart-conditions.asp
LUPUS & HEART DISEASE: A DEADLY COMBO
REPORT #3005
BACKGROUND: The most common type of lupus, systemic lupus erythematosus, is an autoimmune disease that is typically seen in women between the ages of 15 and 45 during their reproductive years. Lupus is more prominent in African American, Hispanic, Asian and Native American women than Caucasian women. You can also be at a higher risk if you have a family member with lupus or other autoimmune disease. Lupus can cause joint pain, fever, skin rashes and organ damage. It may come and go over time. To help with flare-ups: avoid sun exposure, stay active and maintain health habits. The exact cause of lupus is unknown, but these factors could play a role: hormonal changes, environmental factors or family history. A skin rash is one common symptom due to prolonged exposure to the sun and can last days to weeks. It can cause itching and discomfort and typically shows up on the face, hands or wrists. Rashes and sores may fade but others may be permanent. Other parts of the body that can be impacted by the disease include your blood due to reduction in red blood cells or white blood cells or platelets, joints due to arthritis, kidney disease, brain involvement due to confusion, depression or seizures and heart and lungs from inflammation. Common medications used to treat the disease include steroids, hydroxychloroquine, azathioprine, methotrexate, cyclophosphamide, belimumab and rituximab. There are several types of lupus: cutaneous lupus erythematosus which affects the skin, drug-induced lupus caused by medication and neonatal lupus that is found in infants at birth. Treatment is used to control the symptoms and reduce damage to the body. There is no cure for Lupus. It is a chronic life-long condition that will need to be managed regularly.
(Source: https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/4875-lupus)
TO THE HEART OF LUPUS: Lupus increases your risk of heart disease and can cause inflammation in different areas of the heart: endocarditis; heart walls and valves, myocarditis; heart muscle and pericarditis; the sac around the heart. Since treatments of the disease can cause problems with blood vessels or veins and arteries that carry blood to and from the heart, you can develop high blood pressure, anemia, leukopenia; low white blood cells or thrombocytopenia; low platelets in the blood and it can even cause vasculitis, inflammation in the blood vessel walls. Problems with your blood vessels can also show on the skin: Raynaud’s phenomenon; fingers and toes turning white or blue, livedo reticularis, blue or purple pattern seen through the skin or palmar erythema, palms turning red. If you are having symptoms of heart problems your doctor may recommend different tests, including: blood tests, chest x-rays, electrocardiogram and echocardiogram.
(Source: https://www.lupus.org/resources/how-lupus-affects-the-heart-and-circulation)
NEW RESEARCH FROM GERMANY: Promising results from a small study led by rheumatologist Georg Schett at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany may have discovered a way to reset the immune system for the 1 in 1,000 people effected by Lupus. Five patients who were seriously ill with lupus have seen their disease go into remission with one single infusion of modified immune cells. Using the same type of successful cell-based therapies called chimeric antigen receptor (CAR-T) to treat blood cancers, researchers are now testing the approach on lupus. CAR-T therapies work by taking a patient’s immune cells and engineering them to find and destroy roque cells, such as cancer or other immune cells, and then placed back into the body to do their work. The goal for lupus is for the modified cells to hunt down and destroy the faulty B cells, specifically the CD19, which pumps out autoantibodies that attacks the body’s own cells. Results from a blood test showed the one-time therapy wiped out the misguided B cells causing disease-causing autoantibodies to be below detectable levels. It’s too early to call the patients cured, but all five (four women and one man) for the last 5 to 17 months have been in remission and have not relapsed even with a resurgence of B cells after treatment. It will now be tested in larger studies to check for known side effects of the CAR-T therapies and whether it will work for some or all patients and will remission last. Because these therapies are tailored for each patient and the manufacturing capabilities of making modified immune cells, it might only be feasible to use as a last resort for severe lupus patients who don’t respond to other drugs.
(Source: https://www.sciencealert.com/lupus-patients-go-into-remission-in-spectacular-immunotherapy-trial)
* For More Information, Contact: Amy Colgan
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