Lacrimal gland involvement in sarcoidosis. The clinical features of 9 patients

Abstract

Patients and methods: Ocular disease is relatively common in sarcoidosis and can be the initial clinical manifestation in some instances. In this study, we retrospectively evaluated the clinical and demographic features of 9 (1.74%) patients with lacrimal gland (LG) involvement out of 516 sarcoidosis patients who were followed up at our centre over the preceding 36-years. In addition, the characteristics of patients with LG involvement were compared to those of other cases with eye involvement and to other sarcoidosis patients.

Results: In 5 subjects with LG involvement, the chest X-ray was normal. The number of stage 0 subjects among other sarcoidosis patients was significantly lower than among patients with LG involvement (p<0.001). In 2 of these cases, the diagnosis of sarcoidosis was reached by LG biopsy. The mean age of patients with LG involvement was significantly lower than that of other sarcoidosis patients (p<0.001). Also, sarcoidosis-related organ involvement--other than of the LG--was more frequent than in other sarcoidosis patients (p<0.001).

Conclusions: It should be borne in mind that LG involvement might be the initial manifestation of sarcoidosis and the chest X-ray in these patients might be completely normal.