Epidemiological data on sarcoidosis in Italy.

Due to reports on histologically confirmed cases of sarcoidosis coming from diagnosis centres in various Italian regions there are appreciable differences in the frequency of this disease. Sarcoidosis occurs most frequently in north Italy, less frequently in the southern part of the country, and very rarely on the Italian islands. Most of the cases were diagnosed in stage I (70%), involving a small number of Löfgren syndrom cases. 20% of the cases concerned stage II and 5% stage III. Extrapulmonary localizations were reported rarely.