Pulmonal sarcoidosis: A rare side effect of interferon-alpha treatment forchronic hepatitis C infection

This is a case report of a 44-year-old woman who received a 1-year-treatmen t with interferon-alpha for chronic hepatitis C virus infection. 3 months a fter cessation of the therapy she relapsed and was successfully retreated 1 2 months with a combination of interferon-alpha and ribavirin thereafter. D uring the treatment the patient developed a typical flue-like syndrome, dry cough with exertional dyspnea that was initially interpreted as a typical side effect of interferon-alpha treatment. Due to the persisting cough, fur ther radiologic and histologic work up was done and results were significan t for interstitial sarcoidosis. After interferon-treatment was stopped the pulmonary symptoms resolved completely while pathologic changes in radiogra phic imaging persisted. Interferon-alpha may have contributed to the develo pment and progression of sarcoidosis by activation of cellular immunity. Al though there are only few reports about pulmonary sarcoidosis associated wi th interferon-alpha treatment, this entity should be included in the differ ential diagnosis of putative side effects of interferon-alpha therapy.