Towards an era of epidemiological databases for autoimmune diseases

Abstract

Nowadays, autoimmune diseases are among the leading causes of death for a remarkable number of patients all around the world. Recent studies have witnessed that the epidemiological indices for a specific disease can vary according to ethnic and geographical parameters. As a result, the genetic epidemiology of autoimmune diseases is a major matter of study for the worldwide scientific community. We have previously reported the development of dAUTObase (www.dAUTObase.org), a database recording solely epidemiological data of autoimmune diseases in various populations around the globe. Here, we present an important upgrade of the dAUTObase system focused on the development of new data visualization tools oriented to further assist the effective data querying and the mining process.