ABSTRACT
Sarcoidosis is characterized as a genetically complex disease involving a
large number of genes. The importance of the genetic background is reflected by familial clustering, with an elevated risk of developing the dis-
ease if a first-or second-degree family member has sarcoidosis (1,2), as well
as by the different clinical manifestations associated with racial variations.
Patients of different ethnic origins may thus have quite distinct manifesta-
tions of the disease; e.g., an acute form with erythema nodosum (EN) fre-
quently occurs in Scandinavian patients, whereas a more severe form of
skin involvement (lupus pernio) is more frequent in African American
patients, and cardiac involvement and eye symptoms have been reported to be frequent especially in Asian patients (3).
