What Causes Autoimmune Diabetes?
You may want to learn more about the how type 1a diabetes develops. We know this kind of diabetes is caused by an autoimmune process in the body that mistakenly destroys the insulin-producing cells, or beta cells. The autoimmune attack can occur in genetically predisposed individuals. What starts the autoimmune destruction is unknown, but it may be due to environmental factors.
In this section, you can learn more about:
- What is the Immune system?
An overview of the different cells and organs in the immune system and how the immune system works - Autoimmunity and diabetes:
Current ideas about how the immune systems destroys insulin producing cells - Who is at risk?
Tests that help predict who will develop type 1 diabetes - Genetics of type 1a
Genes that are associated with type 1 diabetes