Women and Autoimmune Disease: The Mysterious Ways Your Body Betrays Itself

A cutting-edge examination of the mysterious world of autoimmune disease--and the new discoveries made daily that may save women's lives

Autoimmune diseases--including chronic fatigue syndrome, vasculitis, juvenile diabetes, alopecia, Graves' disease, Sjogren's syndrome, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and multiple sclerosis--are among the most devastating conditions afflicting women today and the most resistant to diagnosis and treatment. In all of them, the body's immune system begins to attack healthy and normally functioning cells. And one of the biggest puzzles is why 80 percent of autoimmune disease sufferers are women. In this groundbreaking book, world-class immunologist Dr. Robert Lahita brings years of intensive research, patient care, and diagnostics to shed light on the mysteries of these conditions, with a particular focus on how they affect--and how he treats--women.

Through case studies, he reveals the early warning signs, symptoms, diagnostic processes, and the most innovative treatments for all the most common--and many of the less well known--autoimmune diseases. He offers a scientifically sound and sensitive work that is the best resource available to help understand these perplexing and debilitating diseases.

Robert G. Lahita, M.D., Ph.D., is a professor of medicine at the Mount Sinai Medical School and chairman of medicine and vice president of the Jersey City Medical Center. He was the chairman of the conference committee of the New York Academy of Sciences and has been elected a fellow of the American College of Physicians, the American College of Rheumatology, the New York Academy of Sciences, and the Royal College of Physicians in London. The Textbook of Autoimmunity, which he edited, is the seminal work on the subject for medical professionals, and he is also the editor of the recently published fourth edition of the standard textbook Systemic Lupus Erythematosus. He has appeared on Good Morning America, CBS This Morning, Today, and Regis & Kelly. Named one of New York magazine's Best Doctors in New York for the last five consecutive years, he lives in Ridgewood, New Jersey, with his family.