RE: New interview, Not just a billion but 10s of billion.26 Jan 2025 15:29
Https://www.cancercenter.com/risk-factors/autoimmune-diseases
This page was reviewed under our medical and editorial policy by
Maurie Markman, MD, President, Medicine & Science
THIS PAGE WAS UPDATED ON MARCH 2, 2022.
Like the two ends of a magnet, cancer and autoimmunity share a common origin but exert powerful forces that work in opposite directions. Both diseases result from failures in the body’s immune system. Cancer often develops because the immune system fails to do its job in attacking defective cells, allowing the cells to divide and grow. Conversely, an autoimmunity—a faulty immune response that leads to diseases such as colitis and lupus—occurs when the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy cells.
On their own, cancer and autoimmunity often create difficult and challenging circumstances for doctors and patients. In patients diagnosed with either disease, these two opposing forces may collide, further complicating treatments and side-effect management efforts. “There is a definite connection between many autoimmune diseases and cancer,” says Anthony Perre, MD, Internist and Chief of the Division of Outpatient Medicine at City of Hope Atlanta, Chicago and Phoenix. “For example, many autoimmune diseases may lead to inflammation, which has been implicated as a factor in the possible cause of cancer.”