Twenty million adults in the United States live with an autoimmune disease. As we head into Autoimmune Awareness Month this March, Dr. Julius Birnbaum offers essential advice for navigating the complex world of various autoimmune diseases. He helps patients, caregivers, and health care professionals understand the diagnosis, management, and treatment of conditions like lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, Sjogren's syndrome, and more. He also shares valuable insight such as why depression is a frequently overlooked cause of pain in autoimmune diseases and why autoimmune diseases can be so hard to diagnose. This essential overview of autoimmune diseases, supplemented with helpful tools for readers and their loved ones, offers hope and empowerment for managing these complex conditions. He is an associate professor of rheumatology at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.