Caroline Wyatt, the BBC's religious affairs correspondent, is to step down from the role after being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
Wyatt, 49, who moved to her present position covering religious news for the media corporation, was diagnosed with the illness a few months ago but is believed to have been battling with the symptoms for a number of years.
Multiple Sclerosis is an incurable neurological disease which sees the central nervous system deteriorate. More than 100,000 people in the UK suffer from the disease which affects memory and thinking, and sometimes emotions. Three times as many women as men suffer from the disease.
On announcing her departure, Wyatt said: "I have been utterly overwhelmed by the support I’ve had from my colleagues, friends and family in recent days and months, and am so grateful for the support the BBC is giving me while I recover from my current relapse.
"After being diagnosed with MS late last year, I feel very lucky to live in a country where the NHS is able to do much to help people with MS, and where so much research is being done. I have lived with the condition for the past 25 years, so the diagnosis came as a relief as it enables me to have treatment and to do all I can to manage it.
"I am tremendously sad to be stepping down from my current specialism as BBC religious affairs correspondent at a time that understanding religion has rarely been more important.
"It has been a privilege to cover the religious leadership of Pope Francis and that of the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, and to meet the many Muslims in the UK and elsewhere who are making clear that the theology and ideology of the so-called Islamic State does not represent the mainstream of their faith."
A spokesman for the BBC said it will advertise the role of religious affairs correspondent externally and no decision has been taken yet about coverage of religious affairs at the corporation.
Wyatt, who joined the BBC in 1991 and was based in Germany, became a notable war correspondent reporting from war zones in Baghdad, in Iraq, Kosovo and Albania during the Balkans War, and also covered the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
She notably reported as an "embedded journalist" travelling with British troops during the second Persian Gulf War in 2003.
"I feel incredibly blessed in having been able to work as a BBC correspondent for the past 23 years, from telling the story of the UK’s Armed Forces in Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan to highlighting the stories of those still battling with their injuries many years later," Wyatt said. "And reporting on the families and children caught up in conflicts around the world, from Chechnya to the Central African Republic."
Wyatt is expected to take a break over the summer and return to the BBC in the autumn to take on a number of presenting roles on Radio 4 and the World Service.
In an email to BBC staff Jonathan Munro, head of newsgathering, said: "She has made a big impact in that role over the last couple of years, after previous success as BBC Defence Correspondent, covering the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and before that as a BBC foreign correspondent based in Berlin, Bonn, Moscow and Paris, reporting on the impact of the fall of the Berlin Wall, as well as the conflicts in Kosovo and Chechnya.
“After an extended break over the summer, Caroline will return to the airwaves to focus on a range of presenting for Radio 4 and the World Service. In due course, she plans to carry out occasional reporting duties for TV and radio where they are compatible with her medical advice.”
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