In endometriosis, the cells manage to block the immune system, as with cancer. This allows the cells to settle outside the endometrium.
- Endometriosis is a disease that is still poorly understood, yet affects 10% of women.
- According to a Swedish researcher, it is linked to a disruption in the immune system: this allows endometrial cells to settle outside the uterus.
- These new findings could help improve diagnosis and treatment.
At least one in ten women suffers from endometriosis in France. This chronic inflammatory disease is still poorly understood. In the body, it manifests itself by the presence of tissue similar to that of the uterine lining, outside the uterine cavity. How do these tissues manage to attach themselves outside the uterus? Swedish researchers have discovered a potential explanation. This team from Umeå University demonstrates that the disease manages to disrupt the immune system.
How endometrial cells manage to evade the immune system
Emma Björk, from the Department of Clinical Sciences, has conducted several research projects on endometriosis.It is known that the so-called natural killer cells of the immune system do not function optimally in endometriosis and therefore do not kill endometriotic cells, but it is not known why.“, she explains in a communicated. Previously, she demonstrated that endometriosis secretes exosomes, vesicles capable of releasing elements outside the cell. In the case of endometriosis, they manage to trigger the inactivity of the immune system, as cancer does. These exosomes carry molecules that inhibit the activity of so-called natural killer cells and increase the destruction of active immune cells.These Two mechanisms give endometriotic tissue the ability to persist and grow in the body,” she concludes.
Cytokines are also involved in endometriosis
She also found that cytokines, proteins that enable communication between cells, are also involved.Endometriosis also secretes so-called cytokines, which produce an immune response that counteracts the elimination of endometriotic cells.”she notes. In short, in their presence, immune cells fail to eliminate endometrial cells that attach themselves outside the uterus.
Future treatments for endometriosis?
For the Swedish scientist, these new findings provide valuable information on understanding the disease and how it occurs. She hopes that they can contribute to the development of new treatments and diagnostic tools.Currently, it takes several years to be diagnosed and the available treatments often cause side effects, she recalls. Exosomes will likely make it easier to diagnose many diseases in the future.”
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