Cardiac Sarcoidosis Causing Sudden Death

Abstract

Sarcoidosis is a granulomatous disease of unclear etiology. Cardiac involvement in sarcoidosis is rarely diagnosed clinically. It is not commonly fatal, but when sarcoidosis is fatal, it is most often from cardiac involvement and when sarcoidosis involves the heart, it frequently causes death. We report a case of sudden death of 48 years male, wherein sarcoidosis with cardiac involvement was diagnosed at histopathological examination. We received a heart weighed 500gms with left ventricular wall thickness 3.5cm. On microscopic examination, the heart wall shows multiple noncaseous granuloma with few multinucleated giant cells and fibrosis around it. No acid fast bacilli identified on ziehlneelsen stain.