News

The antimalarial medication hydroxychloroquine may help treat uveitis, a type of eye inflammation, in some people with ocular sarcoidosis, a study reports. Specifically, over half of the 42 people with sarcoidosis-related uveitis (SAU) responded to hydroxychloroquine, sold under the brand names Plaquenil and Sovuna, with generics available. This allowed…

In cutaneous sarcoidosis, disease-driving immune cells ramp up their energy production, and blocking this energy production may be a useful strategy for treating the disease, a new study shows. The study specifically points to metformin, a metabolism-modulating drug that’s widely used to treat diabetes, as a potential treatment for…

Levels of specific immune complement proteins in blood and cerebrospinal fluid, including C3, factor B, and C5, showed strong potential for distinguishing people with neurosarcoidosis from those without the disease, according to a small study in the U.K. Combinations of several complement proteins yielded more discriminative potential, while combining…

A common genetic variant in the TNFR1 gene, which encodes a protein involved in regulating inflammation, may help identify people with sarcoidosis who are at higher risk of worsening lung function, a new study suggests. Researchers found that patients carrying two copies of the more common form of the…

Atyr Pharma plans to launch a new global clinical trial to test its investigational therapy, efzofitimod, in people with pulmonary sarcoidosis and a restrictive profile, in which the lungs cannot fully expand. The decision follows a type C meeting with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to discuss…

Corticosteroid treatment leads to rapid improvements in kidney function in people with renal sarcoidosis, but later relapses are frequent, requiring additional immunosuppressive therapies, according to a Dutch study. “Our findings support a treatment protocol starting with prednisone [a corticosteroid] … followed by gradual tapering, and the addition of [corticosteroid-sparing]…

A standard heart ultrasound scan, called transthoracic echocardiography (TTE), may help screen for cardiac sarcoidosis when used alongside symptoms and heart rhythm tests, a study found. Adding heart strain imaging or three-dimensional echocardiography did not appear to significantly improve its overall diagnostic value. Although TTE had low sensitivity,…

Black/African American people with sarcoidosis are more likely than non-Hispanic white patients to develop certain eye problems, including inflammation in the front of the eye and nerve damage, a study shows. In contrast, white sarcoidosis patients were found to have a higher risk of inflammation in the back part…

Careful evaluation is required to distinguish among sarcoidosis, silicosis, and silicosarcoidosis, three disorders that can cause similar patterns of lung problems in people exposed to silica, but that progress and respond to treatment differently. A team of scientists in Brazil highlighted the challenges of distinguishing among the three conditions…

Comparing levels of a protein known as ACE, fully, angiotensin-converting enzyme, in urine and blood may help diagnose renal sarcoidosis and assess how severely the kidneys are affected, according to a retrospective analysis of data from a single center in Japan. The findings suggest that measuring ACE levels in…