What is an autoimmune disease?
An autoimmune disease are a set of different rare diseases in which the body’s natural defense system cannot tell the difference between your own cells and foreign cells, in which the body begins to mistakenly attack the normal cells.
There are more than 80 types of autoimmune diseases that affect different parts of the body. Some with treatment options, others with cures, others that are fatal.
Today we will be addressing an autoimmune disease that is quite rare, but is out there in the world today and is affecting about 5% of the population in Canada, and a lot more all over the world.
What is Behcet’s Disease?
Behcet’s disease is a rare disorder that causes the blood vessels to inflate throughout your body. This disease can lead to different signs and symptoms for every patient who carries this disease.
As mentioned above, symptoms vary from one person to another. Some patients live with it daily, others can have it every few days, weeks, or even months. Symptoms can also vary from one area to another. Mouth, skin, genitals, eyes, joints, blood vessels, digestive system, and the brain.
The treatment involves different medications to reduce and try to eliminate these symptoms, or pain killers to help. But unfortunately… Behcet’s Disease does not have a cure.
Chronic disease and autoimmune disease like Behcet’s have been taken to consideration as one of the most challenging burdens in the healthcare system. People will such rare diseases are known to be suffering in different ways, not just physically, but psychologically and psychosocially too. The pain and suffering of treatments reduce their quality of life.
“Quality of Life”
Quality of life is one of the most important factors when dealing with Behcet’s disease, or any disease for that matter. In Behcet’s disease, several lifestyle factors might influence the onset, disease course, and the severity of inflammation in patients who are suffering. Lifestyle changes that help patients with Behcet’s Disease
Physical Activity
Physical activity is one of the most important lifestyle wellnesses that should be taken to consideration for all patients. Getting your Adrenaline boosted through physical activity will keep your blood flowing and keep your mind off the disease itself.
Smoking
Patients who smoke, spreads nicotine around certain areas of the body, along with the mouth which does cause some flaring of symptoms too.
Sleeping Patterns
Sleep quality, and getting enough sleep is a very important associated with self-rated wellness and health status of patients because the imbalance of sleep causes too little deep sleep and too much REM sleep which causes hormonal imbalance which affects the level of inflammation.
Depression and Anxiety
One who stresses out, and becomes overly upset usually flares the inflammation of getting more severe symptoms.
Nutrition
Having a healthy nutrition does cause the patient to have less symptoms, for a healthy body, means a healthy mind, which will make both the physical and psychological health of the patient decrease.
My Experience with Behcet's Disease
My name is Reine Hodroj. I am 23 years old, and I was diagnosed with Behcet’s disease 6 years ago. Before I was diagnosed, I was in and out of emergency rooms every few days from pain and suffering of the symptoms of Behcet’s. I saw 8 different types of specialties, before I got into a rheumatologist’s office, who finally diagnosed me. I was put into different scans, blood tests, and scares.
My case is one of the scary ones, one of the severe ones. I get most of the syptoms, from mouth, eye, genital ulcers, to severe bone pain. With Behcet’s there is no cure. But there is treatment, to a certain extent. For now, we have 6 types of treatments. In some cases, if you are lucky... it works. With me. It did not.
I am on my last dose of treatment, and I have not yet been treated... with the hope of getting my voice and the voices of others who have been diagnosed to fight for another treatment.
I changed my lifestyle to try as much as possible to help my symptoms, I started physical activities, eating healthier, undergoing severe physiological therapy, fixing a good and soothing sleep schedule and I fight so much, every day, to get through this.
I will end this with my favorite quote,
“You’re going to carry this illness for the rest of your life. So you can either wallow in the weight of that, or you can fight for your only life and make it a good story”
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