By Julie Bierach, KWMU
SAINT LOUIS, MO – Doctors at St. Louis University have discovered new information about the development of lupus that could lead to new therapies in the future.
Lupus is an autoimmune disease in which cells in the immune system attack the body's normal cells and tissue, causing inflammation and pain.
The disease affects 1.5 to 2 million people in the US.
In published research, a group of scientists including Dr. Harris Perlman, a molecular microbiologist at SLU, found lupus patients harbor immune cells that carry too many pro-survival proteins.
"And what we found was that patients with lupus have an overabundance of genes that prevent the removal or the death of the cells that cause the disease," Perlman said.
Perlman says the new findings are important because they may lead to a strategy for treating the disease.