What is the difference between disease activity and disease damage?

Disease activity represents the aspects of your disease that are caused by active inflammation in organs targeted by the vasculitis and response to treatment with steroids and immunosuppressive drugs. Disease damage represents the parts of your disease that do not respond to anti-inflammatory and immunosuppressive therapy.  In any particular patient, damage might include problems caused directly by your disease (such as chronic kidney problems or neuropathy causing numbness in the feet), or problems caused by the drugs used to treat vasculitis (such as diabetes or high blood pressure, both of which can be caused by steroid use).

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