Sarcoidosis: Some Concepts of Etiology and Diagnosis

¹ The Medical Service, Veterans Administration Hospital, Atlanta, Georgia, and the Department of Medicine, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia. Maimondes Hospital, Brooklyn, New York.

Recognizing the confusion and many pitfalls, how, then, does one make the diagnosis? How is one certain that a patient has sarcoidosis and not merely a "sarcoid." In essence, only by taking into account the total picture (clinical features, x-ray findings, results of biopsy, course of the disease, contacts with beryllium, and the like), and in particular by keeping in mind that at the present time the etiology is unknown can this be accomplished. Diseases of now known etiologies, but with features similar to those of sarcoidosis, should not be so categorized; e.g., beryllium disease and histoplasmosis.