What is lupus nephritis?

Lupus nephritis is a devastating condition. It can quickly lead to death for people who suffer from it, and years of painful medical treatments for those who survive. It’s one of the worst possible outcomes for lupus, which is a horrible condition on its own. But lupus is in many ways a medical mystery. And medical research is still struggling to get to the bottom of what causes lupus.

That sort of uncertainty about what exactly lupus is filters down to the people who suffer from it and the public at large. Lupus is one of those conditions that just isn’t well understood, which makes taking the time to learn about it very important. So what exactly is lupus? And why does it sometimes lead to lupus nephritis? And most importantly, what can you do to treat it?

What Is Lupus?

Lupus is, on the most basic level, something called an autoimmune condition. That means that it’s the result of a malfunction in your immune system. It causes one of the most vital systems in your body against you, and that makes it a truly devastating condition.

You see, in a healthy immune system, your white blood cells produce something called antibodies. These antibodies constantly look for any intrusion by foreign cells like bacteria or viruses. When they find them, the antibodies quickly latch on to these foreign cells and destroy them. This is why our bodies are able to recover from bacterial or viral infections.

And once they’ve destroyed a certain infection, they become conditioned to recognize these cells the next time they appear and attack them quickly. This is why we can develop immunities to certain diseases after we are infected by them. But in lupus, and other autoimmune conditions, this life-saving mechanism of the body turns against you.

An autoimmune condition like lupus leads to your antibodies becoming conditioned to attack your own cells instead of dangerous foreign bacteria. And the antibodies gradually begin to destroy the cells all over your body. This leads to dangerous inflammation, and it’s responsible for a dangerous complication of lupus: lupus nephritis.

Why Does It Cause Lupus Nephritis?

Nephritis is the medical term for an inflammation of the kidneys. Lupus nephritis, therefore, is simply nephritis caused by lupus. And it can develop in serious or untreated cases of lupus.

Lupus attacks cells all over the body, most visibly the skin, which is why people with lupus develop distinctive rashes or scars. But while lupus-induced skin conditions are often disfiguring, they aren’t usually life-threatening. This isn’t the case when lupus attacks organs like the heart or the kidneys.

Lupus nephritis can severely damage the kidneys, eventually causing them to shut down. And because the kidneys perform an important role in filtering out toxins in the blood, this can kill you without treatment.

How Do We Treat Lupus Nephritis?

Luckily, there are a few things you can do to treat lupus. The first step is to limit the effects of inflammation and there are a number of drugs that work very well in this role. First, there are nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs or NSAIDs. You might not have heard that term before, but you have almost certainly taken a NSAID before in the form of over-the-counter pain relievers like aspirin or ibuprofen.

These drugs reduce the inflammation caused by lupus and are sometimes enough by themselves to treat less serious cases. But when they aren’t enough, doctors can also prescribe corticosteroids. Corticosteroids are hormones that are produced naturally by the body to reduce inflammation of the cells. But doctors can also inject corticosteroids to treat lupus nephritis.

Finally, in serious cases where lupus has already damaged the kidneys beyond repair, the only option is a transplant. Of course, it can take years to get a kidney transplant performed, and in those cases, someone with lupus nephritis might find themselves placed on dialysis. A dialysis machine performs the function of the kidneys artificially, filtering out toxins from the blood.

These treatments, while life-saving, are hard to be on for long periods of time since you need treatment regularly and having your blood filtered and replaced is exactly as draining as it sounds. Unfortunately, this is often the only option in cases of serious lupus nephritis.

So, the good news is that lupus is very treatable if caught early, which is why it’s important to be on the look out for the symptoms of lupus. And it’s important to get treatment early. As always, knowledge about these sorts of conditions is extremely important.

So help us out, do you have lupus nephritis? How did you find out you had lupus? What advice can you give other readers? Let us know in the comments.