Results The inclusion process is illustrated in Figure 2. A total of 117 participants were included in the analysis: 20 healthy controls, 49 patients with sarcoidosis classified as sarcoidosis without SFN, and 48 classified as sarcoidosis with probable SFN according to the updated Besta criteria.19 Figure 2 Flowchart of inclusion process. Patient characteristics are presented in Table 1. There were no significant differences among the patients with sarcoidosis with and without SFN, except for sex: patients with sarcoidosis without SFN were more likely to be male than patients with sarcoidosis and probable SFN (OR=3.6, p=0.003). Symptoms of SFN appeared or were diagnosed an average of 6.4 ± 5.3 years after initial diagnosis of sarcoidosis. Table 1 Patient characteristics in healthy controls and patients with sarcoidosis. P-values were calculated with Kruskal-Wallis for continuous data and with Pearson chi-square for binary data Group Healthy control Sarcoidosis without SFN Sarcoidosis with SFN n 20 49 48 Age (mean yrs ± sd) 48±12 52±11 52±9 Sex Males (n (%)) 10 (50%) 36 (73%) 21 (44%) Height (mean ± sd) 176±9 178±9 176±11 BMI (mean ± sd) 23±2 26±4 28±6 Disease duration sarcoidosis (mean yrs ± sd) 8±6 9±7 BMI = body mass index; SFN = small fiber neuropathy 4 73 4
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjY0ODMw