Autoimmune Hepatitis (AIH) is a rare, chronic disease in which the immune system attacks the liver and causes inflammation and tissue damage, severely impacting patients’ physical health and quality of life. This condition affects all ages, genders and ethnicities, with lifelong maintenance therapy required to avoid relapse and burdensome adverse effects.1 If left untreated, AIH can lead to cirrhosis, liver failure and hepatocellular carcinoma.7
In the United States, AIH affects approximately 140,000 individuals, with prevalence rates increasing.6
The liver processes an individual’s blood, breaking down the nutrients and chemicals the blood carries. AIH occurs when an individual’s immune system attacks its liver, causing significant inflammation and tissue damage as well as severely impacting the liver’s function.7
Symptoms/signs and their severity vary from person to person and can include2:
- Fatigue (experienced by 85% of patients)
- Poor sleep
- Jaundice
- Abdominal discomfort/pain
- Skin rashes
- Itchy skin
- Nausea
- Poor appetite
- Joint pain
- Enlarged liver (hepatomegaly) and/or spleen (splenomegaly)
- Risk of liver fibrosis and eventually liver scaring (cirrhosis)
Preexisting Conditions
Patients that have other autoimmune conditions have a higher chance of developing another autoimmune disease such as AIH.2
Gender
AIH affects all genders but affects females 4 times as often as males.2
Environmental Factors
Various medications (e.g., nitrofurantoin and minocycline) and several viruses (e.g., Epstein-Barr virus, cytomegalovirus, herpes, hepatitis A, B, and C and parvovirus B19) have been linked to AIH. Additional environmental factors that are associated with AIH include significant stress and chemical exposures.7
AIH patients require life-long maintenance therapy to avoid relapse and the burdensome adverse effects of this condition. Standard of care (SOC) for AIH is chronic, immunosuppressive treatment with corticosteroids and other immunosuppressive agents like azathioprine.7 While steroids and other immunosuppressive drugs can help manage AIH, these treatments may have life-altering side effects – including osteoporosis, high blood pressure, diabetes and fatigue – and increase an individual’s risk of infection and malignancies.3 Following treatment using current SOC, approximately 35% of patients do not go into remission, and approximately 50-87% of adults who go into remission relapse once treatment is discontinued.5 If left untreated, autoimmune hepatitis can result in cirrhosis, liver failure and hepatocellular carcinoma.3 There is a significant unmet medical need for effective AIH treatments that reduce the use of chronic immunosuppression.
