Can some one tell me about the disease called sarcoidosis?

Question

The doctors said I have this want to know more about it

Answer 1

What Is Sarcoidosis?

Sarcoidosis (sar"koi-do'sis) involves inflammation that produces tiny lumps of cells in various organs in your body. The lumps are called granulomas (gran"u-lo'mahs) because they look like grains of sugar or sand. They are very small and can be seen only with a microscope.

These tiny granulomas can grow and clump together, making many large and small groups of lumps. If many granulomas form in an organ, they can affect how the organ works. This can cause symptoms of sarcoidosis.

Sarcoidosis can occur in almost any part of your body, although it usually affects some organs more than others. It usually starts in one of two places:

Lungs
Lymph nodes, especially the lymph nodes in your chest cavity.
Sarcoidosis also often affects your:

Skin
Eyes
Liver.
Less often, sarcoidosis affects your:

Spleen
Brain
Nerves
Heart
Tear glands
Salivary glands
Bones and joints.
Rarely, sarcoidosis affects other organs, including your:

Thyroid gland
Breasts
Kidneys
Reproductive organs.
Sarcoidosis almost always occurs in more than one organ at a time.

Sarcoidosis has an active and a nonactive phase:

In the active phase, the granulomas form and grow. In this phase, symptoms can develop, and scar tissue can form in the organs where the granulomas occur.
In the nonactive phase, the inflammation goes down, and the granulomas stay the same size or shrink. But the scars may remain and cause symptoms.
The course of the disease varies greatly among people.

In many people, sarcoidosis is mild. The inflammation that causes the granulomas may get better on its own. The granulomas may stop growing or shrink. Symptoms may go away within a few years.
In some people, the inflammation remains but doesn't get worse. You may also have symptoms or flare-ups and need treatment every now and then.
In other people, sarcoidosis slowly gets worse over the years and can cause permanent organ damage. Although treatment can help, sarcoidosis may leave scar tissue in the lungs, skin, eyes, or other organs. The scar tissue can affect how the organs work. Treatment usually does not affect scar tissue.
Changes in sarcoidosis usually occur slowly (e.g., over months). Sarcoidosis does not usually cause sudden illness. However, some symptoms may occur suddenly. They include:

Disturbed heart rhythms
Arthritis in the ankles
Eye symptoms.
In some serious cases in which vital organs are affected, sarcoidosis can result in death.

Sarcoidosis is not a form of cancer.

There is no known way to prevent sarcoidosis.

Sarcoidosis was once thought to be an uncommon condition. It's now known to affect tens of thousands of people throughout the United States. Because many people who have sarcoidosis have no symptoms, it's hard to know how many people have the condition.

Sarcoidosis was identified in the late 1860s. Since then, scientists have developed better tests to diagnose it and made advances in treating it.

Answer 2

What is Sarcoidosis?

Sarcoidosis is a disease due to inflammation. It can appear in almost any organ of the body most often affecting the lungs, lymph nodes, skin or eyes.

No one knows the cause of sarcoidosis. In fact, there maybe multiple causes or initiators. The disease can appear suddenly and disappear. Or it can develop gradually and go on to produce symptoms that come and go, sometimes for a lifetime. In many people it is asymptomatic. As sarcoidosis progresses, small lumps, or granulomas, appear in the affected organs. In the majority of cases, these granulomas do not disappear; the organs may remain inflamed or scarred (fibrotic).

Two skin doctors working independently, Dr. Jonathan Hutchinson and Dr. Caesar Boeck in Norway, first identified sarcoidosis over 100 years ago. Sarcoidosis was originally called Hutchinson's disease or Boeck's disease. Sarcoidosis was once considered a rare disease. We now know that it is a common chronic illness that appears all over the world. Indeed, it is the most common fibrotic lung disorder and occurs often enough in the United States for Congress to have declared a National Sarcoidosis Awareness Day in 1990.

Much about the cause(s) of sarcoidosis remains unknown. But, if you have sarcoidosis you can be reassured that patients with sarcoidosis are usually asymptomatic or have mild symptoms. In most cases, the illness does not interfere with the patient’s life, is quite stable and often goes away by itself. Sarcoidosis is not cancer. It is not contagious, and your friends and family will not catch it from you.

Answer 3

Sarcoidosis is an inflammatory problem and some people believe it's an autoimmune disorder where the immune system just doesn't work correctly.

What happens is a bunch of cells form clumps known as granulolas in organs. Th most common areas affected lungs, skin, eyes and liver, but it can affect anything.

Here is a good video to learn more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TznGDCJpo_4&feature=youtu.be

Answer 4

I have a medical dictionary that states Glucocorticoids are the first choice of treatment, if these cant be used then...a list follows 1. methotrexate 2. chloroquine 3. azathioprine 4. oxyphenbutazone these drugs should be tried, it also states that prognosis is generally good, however fatalities occur in about 10% of the patients. Good Luck to you and your family.

Answer 5

From what I gathered, it seems to be a disease that affects the fibrous tissue in any given organ. The tubercles in bone and other tissue becomes hard, and coarse. You can even have lesions that come through you skin....look in the net....good luck...

Answer 6

Sarcoidosis (also called sarcoid or Besnier-Boeck disease) is an immune system disorder characterised by non-necrotising granulomas (small inflammatory nodules). Virtually any organ can be affected; however, granulomas most often appear in the lungs (D86.0) or the lymph nodes (D86.1). Symptoms can occasionally appear suddenly but usually appear gradually. When viewing X-rays of the lungs, sarcoidosis can have the appearance of tuberculosis or lymphoma. Because of its varying forms and symptoms, it is almost always an incorrect diagnosis during episodes of Fox television's hit show House MD.




Epidemiology
Sarcoidosis occurs throughout the world in all races. It is more commonly seen in people of African descent than Caucasians, primarily people of northern European descent in the latter case. Pulmonary involvement is the most common presentation of sarcoidosis, but it can manifest in any organ.


[edit] Signs and symptoms

Sarcoidosis in a Lymph Node.Sarcoidosis is a systemic disease that can affect any organ. Common symptoms are vague, such as fatigue unchanged by sleep, lack of energy, weight loss, aches and pains, arthralgia, dry eyes, blurry vision, shortness of breath, a dry hacking cough or skin lesions. The cutaneous symptoms are protean, and range from rashes and noduli (small bumps) to erythema nodosum or lupus pernio. It is often asymptomatic.

The combination of erythema nodosum, bilateral hilar lymphadenopathy and arthralgia is called Lofgren syndrome. This syndrome has a relatively good prognosis.

Renal, liver (including portal hypertension), heart or brain involvement may cause further symptoms and altered functioning. Manifestations in the eye include uveitis and retinal inflammation, which may result in loss of visual acuity or blindness. Sarcoidosis affecting the brain or nerves is known as neurosarcoidosis.

The combination of anterior uveitis, parotitis and fever are called Heerfordt-Waldenstrom syndrome. (D86.8)


[edit] Investigations
Hypercalcemia (high calcium levels) and its symptoms may be the result of excessive vitamin D production.

Sarcoidosis most often manifests as a restrictive disease of the lungs, causing a decrease in lung volume and decreased compliance (the ability to stretch). The disease typically limits the amount of air drawn into the lungs, but produces higher than normal expiratory flow ratios. The vital capacity (full breath in, to full breath out) is decreased, and most of this air can be blown out in the first second. This means the FEV1/FVC ratio is increased from the normal of about 80%, to 90%. Obstructive lung changes, causing a decrease in the amount of air that can be exhaled, may occur when enlarged lymph nodes in the chest compress airways or when internal inflammation or nodules impede airflow.

Chest X-ray changes are divided into four stages

Stage 1 bihilar lymphadenopathy
Stage 2 bihilar lymphadenopathy and reticulonodular infiltrates
Stage 3 bilateral infiltrates
Stage 4 fibrocystic sarcoidosis typically with upward hilar retraction, cystic & bullous changes
Because sarcoidosis can affect multiple organ systems, follow-up on a patient with sarcoidosis should always include an EKG, ophthalmologic exam, liver function tests, serum calcium and 24hour urine calcium.


Causes and pathophysiology
No direct cause of sarcoidosis has been identified, although there have been reports of cell wall deficient bacteria that may be possible pathogens[1]. These bacteria are not identified in standard laboratory analysis. It has been thought that there may be a hereditary factor because some families have multiple members with sarcoidosis. To date, no reliable genetic markers have been identified, and an alternate hypothesis is that family members share similar exposures to environmental pathogens. There have also been reports of transmission of sarcoidosis via organ transplants[2].

Sarcoidosis frequently causes a dysregulation of vitamin D production; extrarenal (outside the kidney) production can be marked. Production of vitamin D goes on outside the kidneys. Specifically, macrophages inside the granulomas convert vitamin D to its active form, resulting in elevated levels of the hormone 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D and symptoms of hypervitaminosis D that may include fatigue, lack of strength or energy, irritability, metallic taste, temporary memory loss or cognitive problems. Physiological compensatory responses (e.g. suppression of the parathyroid hormone levels) may mean the patient does not develop frank hypercalcemia.

Sarcoidosis has been associated with celiac disease. Celiac disease is a condition in which there is a chronic reaction to certain protein chains, commonly referred to as glutens, found in some cereal grains. This reaction causes destruction of the villi in the small intestine, with resulting malabsorption of nutrients.


[edit] Treatment
Corticosteroids, most commonly prednisone, have been the standard treatment for many years. In some patients, this treatment can slow or reverse the course of the disease, but other patients unfortunately do not respond to steroid therapy. The use of corticosteroids in mild disease is controversial because many times the disease can remit spontaneously. Additionally, corticosteroids have many recognized dose- and duration-related side effects, and their use has been linked to relapses and worsening of the disease.

Severe symptoms are generally treated with steroids, and steroid-sparing agents such as azathioprine and methotrexate are often used. Rarely, cyclophosphamide has also been used. As the granulomas are caused by collections of immune system cells, particularly T cells, there has been some early indications of success using immunosuppressants, interleukin-2 inhibitors or anti-tumor necrosis factor treatment (such as infliximab). Unfortunately, none of these have provided reliable treatment and there can be significant side effects such as an increased risk of reactivating latent tuberculosis.

Disciplined avoidance of sunlight and Vitamin D foods is necessary in patients who are prone to develop hypercalcemia and will help relieve symptoms in all sarcoidosis patients.

Antibiotic therapy has been reported to be effective for lung, lymph and cutaneous manifestations of sarcoidosis[5] but this therapy is not currently the standard of care. On March 28, 2006, the U.S. FDA Office of Orphan Products Development designated Minocycline in the treatment of sarcoidosis,

In few cases alternative medicines like homeopathy seems effective even though there is no particular evidence or testing done.