As death from kidney disease has declined, heart attacks and related cardiovascular diseases have emerged as leading causes of early mortality in people with lupus.
Infections, cardiovascular disease, and end-organ damage remain the major causes of death in SLE.
Infections, atherosclerotic disease, and active systemic lupus erythematosus or organ damage caused by SLE are the main causes of death in patients with SLE, but the proportion of early deaths caused by active SLE has decreased over time.
Kidneys. Up to half of people who have lupus get kidney problems. They can be dangerous. These problems are more likely when you also have other lupus symptoms, such as fatigue, arthritis, rash, fever, and weight loss.
The most frequent causes of death were active SLE (26.5%), thromboses (26.5%), and infections (25%) (Table 4). Most patients who died of active SLE had progressive, frequently multisystem disease. The most frequent infections were bacterial sepsis of pulmonary (8.8%), abdominal (7.4%), and urinary (5.9%) origin.
Pericarditis is the most common heart problem associated with active lupus and occurs in about 25% of people with SLE. The condition occurs when the pericardium—the thin membrane surrounding your heart—becomes swollen and irritated, causing it to leak fluid around the heart.
Nonspecific fatigue, fever, arthralgia, and weight changes are the most common symptoms in new cases or recurrent active SLE flares.
Can a person die from SLE? Causes of premature death associated with SLE are mainly active disease, organ failure (e.g., kidneys), infection, or cardiovascular disease from accelerated atherosclerosis.
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), often referred to as simply “lupus” is a chronic, systemic autoimmune disease that affects many organ systems – most commonly the skin, joints, and kidneys.
SLE is a chronic systemic autoimmune disease that is associated with considerable morbidity and mortality.
Among male decedents with SLE, the median age at death was 61 years, compared with 73 years in the general population. Of male decedents with SLE, 23.5% were black, compared with only 12% in the general population. The age-standardized mortality was highest among American Indian males.
While there is no cure for lupus, people with the disease are living longer, healthier lives than in years past. Today, most people diagnosed with lupus in adulthood can expect to live a normal life span. Only 10 to 15 percent of people with lupus die prematurely due to complications of the disease.
Some people with lupus produce antibodies that attack certain blood-clotting factors, causing the blood to clot too easily. This can lead to mild or severe problems. Some of these are stroke, heart attack, deep vein thrombosis, miscarriage, and pre-eclampsia. The lungs.
Sudden death in lupus patients is uncommon in the literature. A few cases of sudden death not due to myocardial infarction have been reported. One of them was a patient with both myocarditis and thyroiditis who apparently had myocardial failure and arrhythmias leading to death.
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is the most common form of lupus and makes up 70% of the cases. In fact, if you have SLE, you're eight times more likely to have a stroke compared with the general public. Strokes account for about 30% of the deaths among people with SLE.
SLE may also affect other organs such as the muscles (myositis), the lung (pneumonitis), and the heart (myocarditis). Overall, SLE symptoms and signs are caused by local inflammation in various organs that if left untreated may result in permanent organ damage.
Lupus is an autoimmune disease link—a disorder in which the body's immune system attacks the body's own cells and organs. Kidney disease caused by lupus may get worse over time and lead to kidney failure. If your kidneys fail, you will need dialysis or a kidney transplant to maintain your health.
SLE can cause various pulmonary diseases, such as pleural effusion/pleuritis, shrinking lung syndrome, acute pneumonitis, DAH, chronic ILD, and pulmonary hypertension [35]. Pleuritis is the most common intrathoracic disease in SLE, which presents with chest pain, cough, dyspnea, and pleural effusion [34,83].
The great majority of deaths in patients with end-stage lupus nephritis occur in the first 3 months of dialysis and most often result from infection. Later, infection and cardiovascular complications are common causes of death.
The vast majority of people diagnosed with the condition will have a normal or near-normal life expectancy. However, some people with SLE are still at risk of life-threatening complications as a result of damage to internal organs and tissues, such as heart attack or stroke.
The most common manifestation of neuro-lupus is cognitive dysfunction, which is characterized by clouded thinking, confusion, and impaired memory.
Brain Atrophy. —Diffuse and regional brain atrophy is seen in up to 67% of patients with SLE and NPSLE (39). Brain atrophy manifests as loss of white and gray matter, with compensatory generalized enlargement of subarachnoid spaces (Fig 9) and widened sulci, and it can be assessed with CT and MRI.
The burden of cardiovascular disease, including coronary heart disease, is high in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and greater than that in the general population. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death among patients with SLE.