Lifestyle & Autoimmune Disease
Lifestyle factors can influence the immune system and inflammation, but their importance varies among autoimmune diseases. Research has linked factors such as smoking, physical activity, sleep, stress, body weight, and diet with autoimmune disease risk or symptoms.
Some lifestyle changes have clear benefits. Avoiding smoking, exercising regularly, getting adequate sleep, managing stress, and eating a nutritious diet can improve overall health and may be particularly important for people living with chronic inflammatory disease.
A more difficult question is whether lifestyle changes can alter the course of an autoimmune disease or help some people achieve remission.
What Does the Research Show?
The evidence is strongest when we look at specific autoimmune diseases and specific interventions, rather than autoimmune disease as a whole.
Smoking, for example, is a well-established risk factor for rheumatoid arthritis and can contribute to more severe disease. Exercise can improve fatigue, physical function, and quality of life in conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis.
Diet is more complicated. Some dietary patterns may improve symptoms or markers of inflammation, but the evidence varies considerably by disease. Sleep, stress, body weight, and metabolic health are also being studied.
Lifestyle as Part of Treatment
Lifestyle and medical treatment do not have to be competing approaches. Appropriate medical care can be combined with attention to nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress, smoking, and metabolic health.
Lifestyle changes may improve symptoms and general health even when they do not alter the underlying autoimmune disease.
Some functional-medicine physicians, including Mark Hyman, place greater emphasis on identifying possible contributors such as diet, gut health, infections, environmental exposures, and metabolic health. These are interesting areas of research, although the evidence for particular tests and treatments varies considerably.
Whether lifestyle interventions can help some people achieve remission or reduce their need for medication remains an important question, and the answer may differ substantially from one autoimmune disease to another.
Key Takeaways
Lifestyle can influence health, symptoms, and quality of life in people with autoimmune disease.
Evidence is most useful when we look at specific diseases and specific interventions.
Lifestyle and conventional medical treatment can be complementary rather than competing approaches.
Functional medicine raises interesting questions about possible contributors to autoimmune disease, but individual claims need to be evaluated on the evidence.
Whether lifestyle changes can help produce or maintain remission remains an important area of research.
Learn More
Dr. Hyman discusses possible contributors to autoimmune disease and a functional-medicine approach to diet, gut health, environmental factors, and lifestyle.
An accessible NIH overview of autoimmune diseases, their causes, diagnosis, and treatment.
Dr. Hyman discusses five possible contributors to autoimmune disease—diet, toxins, gut health, infections, and stress—and describes his functional-medicine approach.