Autoimmune Nervous System Disease Processes

Immunosuppressant therapies now make many of the autoimmune disorders treatable but not curable. The 

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In summary, complete examination of CSF, including basic biochemical analysis and qualitative cytology with the determination of specific CSF proteins and isoelectric focusing, provides very sensitive diagnostic imformation concerning serous inflammatory processes in the central nervous system, including diseases of autoimmune origin such as multiple sclerosis. 

Most cells of the immune system are ordinarily kept apart from those of the nervous system by means of the blood-brain barrier. However, allergic encephalomyelitis, in which T cells attack the myelin sheath of brain neurons, can easily be induced in mice.506 A similar autoimmune process is thought to be involved in human multiple sclerosis (see Chapter 30, pp. 1769, 1808, and Fig. 30-9).507,508 High levels of circulating IgM are found in some demyelinating diseases of peripheral neurons.508 In Rasmussen s encephalitis, which causes brain inflammation and epilepsy, serum antibodies attack a glutamate receptor subunit GluR3.509... 

CKs have important roles in a large diversity of human pathological conditions, namely in HIV infection transplant rejection rheumatic, allergic, and autoimmune diseases cancer atherosclerosis and general immunoinflammatory processes (systemic, or related with central nervous system), and are expected as promising targets for new molecular therapies. ... 

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