Role in Disease
IL-6 is relevant to many diseases such as diabetes, atherosclerosis, depression, Alzheimer's Disease, systemic lupus erythematosus, prostate cancer, and rheumatoid arthritis.
Advanced/metastatic cancer patients have higher levels of IL-6 in their blood. Hence there is an interest in developing anti-IL-6 agents as therapy against many of these diseases. The first such is tocilizumab which has been approved for rheumatoid arthritis. Another, ALD518, is in clinical trials.
Read more about this topic: Interleukin 6
Famous quotes containing the words role in, role and/or disease:
“Friends serve central functions for children that parents do not, and they play a critical role in shaping children’s social skills and their sense of identity. . . . The difference between a child with close friendships and a child who wants to make friends but is unable to can be the difference between a child who is happy and a child who is distressed in one large area of life.”
—Zick Rubin (20th century)
“What is charm then? The free giving of a grace, the spending of something given by nature in her role of spendthrift ... something extra, superfluous, unnecessary, essentially a power thrown away.”
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)
“For somehow this disease inheres in tyranny, never to trust one’s friends.”
—Aeschylus (525–456 B.C.)