The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has unveiled its first agency-wide strategic plan to address autoimmune diseases, supporting research on preclinical autoimmunity, early diagnosis, and innovative therapies. An estimated 23.5-50 million Americans are living with one or more autoimmune diseases.

The initiative follows a congressional directive in 2023 that led to the creation of the NIH Office of Autoimmune Disease Research (OADR) within the Office of Research on Women’s Health. The office convened a committee with representatives from multiple NIH institutes and centers to develop the plan, gathering input from researchers, clinicians, patient advocates, and people living with autoimmune diseases to define research priorities.

The initiative “is long overdue,” said Sonia Sharma, PhD, of the Center for Autoimmunity and Inflammation at La Jolla Institute for Immunology in La Jolla, California, in an interview with Medscape Medical News. “Individually, some folks may consider these rare diseases; but as a collective, they are not rare and they are increasing.”

Source: MEDspace