Table 1.

Criteria for determining a disease as autoimmune

1. Demonstration of an immune response to a precise autoantigen in all patients with the disease

2. Reproduction of the lesion by administration of autoantibody or T cells into a normal animal

3. Induction of lesion by immunizing an animal with relevant purified autoantigen

4. Isolation or presence of autoantibody or autoreactive T cell from lesion (or serum)

5. Correlation of autoantibody or autoreactive T cell with disease activity

6. Presence of other autoimmune disorders or autoantigens associated with disease

7. Immune absorption with purified autoantigen abrogates pathogenic autoantibody or autoreactive T cell

8. Reduction of pathogenic autoantibody or T cell associated with clinical improvement

Table adapted from Rodriguez M. Have we finally identified an autoimmune demyelinating disease? Ann Neurol. 2009; 66(5):572–573. Reproduced with permission of John Wiley & Sons, Inc