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:
“So successful has been the camera’s role in beautifying the world that photographs, rather than the world, have become the standard of the beautiful.”
—Susan Sontag (b. 1933)
“The Declaration [of Independence] was not a protest against government, but against the excess of government. It prescribed the proper role of government, to secure the rights of individuals and to effect their safety and happiness. In modern society, no individual can do this alone. So government is not a necessary evil but a necessary good.”
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)
“Smoking ... is downright dangerous. Most people who smoke will eventually contract a fatal disease and die. But they don’t brag about it, do they? Most people who ski, play professional football or drive race cars, will not die—at least not in the act—and yet they are the ones with the glamorous images, the expensive equipment and the mythic proportions. Why this should be I cannot say, unless it is simply that the average American does not know a daredevil when he sees one.”
—Fran Lebowitz (b. 1950)