Six patients were noted to have sarcoidosis in the ALS patient population seen over a 10 year period.  We estimated the total number of ALS patients seen over the 10 year period to be 1000, and based on the co-incidence rates would expect no more than one patient with sarcoidosis.

In these patients, the average age was 59; two were male and four were female; one was African-American and five were Caucasian; four had spinal onset and two had bulbar onset; five had lower motor neuron predominance and one had upper motor neuron predominance.

The observation of patients with sarcoidosis in a single ALS clinic suggests that the incidence may be greater in ALS patients compared to the general population. Increased incidence of sarcoidosis in ALS suggests a potential association with common epidemiologic or immunologic features; however, this preliminary observation highlights the need to further determine the co-incidental occurrence of both diagnoses across larger patient populations.