Behçet’s UK becomes an affiliate charity of Our Future Health

Our affiliate charities are sharing their expertise in the prevention, early detection and treatment of disease with Our Future Health. By joining forces, the charities are also able to shape the programme to ensure it is fit to serve the research needs of a range of health conditions and diseases.

Behçet’s UK

Behçet’s UK is the UK’s primary charity for people with Behçet’s disease, including those who are yet to be diagnosed. The charity promotes research into the cause, effects, treatment and management of this rare, complex and debilitating lifelong condition. It also seeks to raise awareness of the disease amongst clinicians and supports Behçet’s patients and their families. Behçet’s UK’s top priority is reducing the time for a Behçet’s diagnosis.

Behçet’s

Behçet’s disease is a chronic condition caused by the immune system becoming overactive, leading to unpredictable outbreaks of inflammation. This inflammation particularly affects blood vessels across the body. Behçet’s causes flare-ups of symptoms like blurred vision, ulcers and swollen joints, and in rare cases these flare-ups can have serious consequences such as vision loss or strokes.

Although the exact number of patients is uncertain, Behçet’s UK estimates that roughly 2,500 people in the UK have Behçet’s disease. It can affect all ethnic groups, but is most common among people of Mediterranean, Middle Eastern and Asian descent.

There is no known cause of Behçet’s disease and currently no cure, and treated with ‘off label’ drugs which react differently in everyone. Behçet’s UK is focused on accelerating research into the disease to improve outcomes for Behçet’s patients.

Affiliate charities

Our Future Health is joining with many of the UK’s leading health research charities who are providing valuable support and expertise to help develop Our Future Health. They will make a big impact in allowing us to ultimately change the way we prevent, detect and treat diseases. 

Tony Thornburn, Chair of Behçet’s UK, said, “From the outset I was impressed with the innovative and holistic way Our Future Health was approaching health conditions across the country – and its priority of reaching into all communities.  As a rare condition that can and does affect any organ in the body Behçet’s, often complicated by comorbidity and looking like other rare diseases, it needs this systemic research approach to advance understanding and can be regarded as a trailblazing condition to help represent the rare disease space”.

Dr Raghib Ali, CEO and Chief Medical Officer of Our Future Health, said, “We’re really pleased to welcome Behçet’s UK as our newest affiliate charity partner. We want to ensure that all health conditions are represented in our research programme, including rare diseases. This partnership will help us drive forward research into preventing, detecting and treating conditions like Behçet’s disease.”

Read more about our partnerships.