Systemic Autoimmunity and Idiopathic Inflammatory Demyelinating Diseases of the Central Nervous System (IIDDs)
Ji Won Yang, MD, Sung-Min Kim, MD
Department of Neurology, Seoul National University College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea
Idiopathic inflammatory demyelinating disease (IIDDs) is a disease entity containing multiple sclerosis
(MS), neuromyelitis optica (NMO), transverse myelitis, optic neuritis and so on. Many recent
studies revealed that there might be a common pathomechanism between IIDDs and systemic autoimmune
diseases. Here we provide a general overview for the evidence of systemic autoimmunity in
the NMO and MS, and provide a possible hypothesis for this phenomenon.
