Rare and common manifestation of musculoskeletal and sinonasal sarcoidosis: A case report

TL;DR

This paper presents a rare case of sarcoidosis affecting the musculoskeletal and sinonasal systems, highlighting the challenges in diagnosing this complex disease.

Contribution

The paper emphasizes the importance of considering sarcoidosis in differential diagnoses to avoid delayed treatment.

Findings

Musculoskeletal and sinonasal sarcoidosis are uncommon and often overlooked.

Diagnosis requires a combination of clinical, radiological, and pathological evidence.

Failure to consider sarcoidosis can lead to ineffective treatment plans.

Abstract

Sarcoidosis is a systemic granulomatous disease that can affect multiple organ systems. Although many sarcoidosis patients are asymptomatic, the variable clinical progression of symptomatic patients and the nonspecific presentation make diagnosis difficult in certain cases. Musculoskeletal and sinonasal involvement of sarcoidosis are uncommon manifestations, and they are often only seen in patients with widespread disease. Diagnosis of osseous sarcoidosis, sarcoid arthropathy, and sarcoid rhinosinusitis are typically based on a combination of clinical history, radiological findings, and pathologic specimens. Although there are classic image findings, such as lacelike honeycomb appearance of small bones of the hands or hilar/mediastinal lymphadenopathy, sole reliance on image findings for the diagnosis of sarcoidosis is unreasonable as many findings are nonspecific. However, failure to include sarcoidosis in the differential diagnosis often leads to a delay in recognition of musculoskeletal or sinonasal involvement and results in ineffective treatment plan. Even in patients with biopsy-proven sarcoidosis, some image findings in isolation that may represent granulomatous infiltrates are disregarded as nonspecific without raising the possibility of sarcoidosis due to its rare occurrence. Here we discuss a case of multisystemic sarcoidosis in a 42-year-old female with a constellation of classic and rare findings of biopsy-proven sarcoidosis.

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