SynthesisBMC pulmonary medicine2016
Is there any association between Sarcoidosis and infectious agents?: a systematic review and meta-analysis.
Synthesis in BMC pulmonary medicine, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 55 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
55 citing papers in PubMed, 127 citations in OpenAlex.
- Activation of mucosal-associated invariant T cells in the lungs of sarcoidosis patients.Scientific reports · 2019Trial
- No detectable infectious agents in Langerhans cell histiocytosis with lung involvement.ERJ open research · 2026Article
- Mycobacterium tuberculosis-specific blood immune signatures distinguish sarcoidosis from tuberculosis disease.Journal of immunology (Baltimore, Md. : 1950) · 2026Article
- Exploring microbial signatures in sarcoidosis: etiological and therapeutic implications of host-microbiota interactions.Frontiers in immunology · 2026Review
- Cardiac Sarcoidosis: Pathophysiology and Diagnostic-Therapeutic Processes.Reviews in cardiovascular medicine · 2026Review
- Neurosarcoidosis: a review from diagnosis and future perspectives.EClinicalMedicine · 2025Review
- Deep sequencing of 16mSystems · 2025Article
- Microbiome Against the Background of the Complex Aetiology in Sarcoidosis-What Do We Already Know?Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Sarcoidosis: molecular mechanisms and therapeutic strategies.Molecular biomedicine · 2025Review
- The pathological correlation between pulmonary tuberculosis and sarcoidosis patients and the impact of presence of nodules on pulmonary tuberculosis patients.Frontiers in cellular and infection microbiology · 2025Article
- Latent microbial reactivation and immune dysregulation in sarcoidosis: bridging pathogenesis and precision therapeutics.Frontiers in medicine · 2025Review
- Certolizumab-induced sarcoidosis in a patient with psoriatic arthritis - a case report and review of literature.Rheumatology international · 2024Review
- Severe headache as the first presentation of post-COVID-19 brain and spinal cord injury resembling neurosarcoidosis.Postepy psychiatrii neurologii · 2024Article
- New-onset sarcoidosis in a patient with long COVID.Clinical case reports · 2024Article
- Sarcoidosis versus Granulomatous and Lymphocytic Interstitial Lung Disease in Common Variable Immunodeficiency: A Comparative Review.Biomedicines · 2024Review
- Granulomatous liver diseases.Hepatology communications · 2024Review
- Incidence, management and prognosis of new-onset sarcoidosis post COVID-19 infection.Sarcoidosis, vasculitis, and diffuse lung diseases : official journal of WASOG · 2024Article
- Review
- Sarcoidosis rates in BCG-vaccinated and unvaccinated young adults: A natural experiment using Danish registers.Seminars in arthritis and rheumatism · 2023Article
- Potential Association ofMicroorganisms · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundDuring the last few years, investigators have debated the role that infectious agents may have in sarcoidosis pathogenesis. With the emergence of new molecular biology techniques, several studies have been conducted; therefore, we performed a meta-analysis in order to better explain this possible association.
methodsThis review was conducted in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement from the Cochrane collaboration guidelines. Four different databases (Medline, Scopus, Web of Science, and Cochrane Collaboration) were searched for all original articles published from 1980 to 2015. The present meta-analysis included case-control studies that reported the presence of microorganisms in samples of patients with sarcoidosis using culture methods or molecular biology techniques. We used a random effects or a fixed-effect model to calculate the odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI). Sensitivity and subgroup analyses were performed in order to explore the heterogeneity among studies.
resultsFifty-eight studies qualified for the purpose of this analysis. The present meta-analysis, the first, to our knowledge, in evaluation of all infectious agents proposed to be associated with sarcoidosis and involving more than 6000 patients in several countries, suggests an etiological link between Propionibacterium acnes and sarcoidosis, with an OR of 18.80 (95% CI 12.62, 28.01). We also found a significant association between sarcoidosis and mycobacteria, with an OR of 6.8 (95% CI 3.73, 12.39). Borrelia (OR 4.82; 95% CI 0.98, 23.81), HHV-8 (OR 1.47; 95% CI 0.02, 110.06) as well as Rickettsia helvetica, Chlamydia pneumoniae, Epstein-barr virus and Retrovirus, although suggested by previous investigations, were not associated with sarcoidosis.
conclusionThis meta-analysis suggests that some infectious agents can be associated with sarcoidosis. What seems clear is that more than one infectious agent might be implicated in the pathogenesis of sarcoidosis; probably the patient's geographical location might dictate which microorganisms are more involved. Future investigations and more clinical trials are need to bring these evidences to a more global level.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.