Specific Biomarkers Involved in Sarcoidosis Diagnosis and Prognosis

Biomarker discovery in sarcoidosis mechanisms represents an innovative research tool. Inflammatory responses in sarcoidosis patients were analyzed by flow cytometry to highlight CD8a+CD45+, CD45+CD8a−, CD4+CD19+, CD4+CD19−, CD3+CD56+CD16+, CD56+CD16+, and CD16+CD56− as predictive biomarkers. In our study, monocyte-derived macrophage activation (M1 phenotype), represented by CD8a+CD45+ expression, is characteristic of granulomatous inflammation in active and progressive sarcoidosis and serves as a biomarker with very good accuracy and high specificity for establishing a diagnosis of sarcoidosis. As a prognostic biomarker, it is an independent predictive factor of disease progression, being negatively associated with applied treatments by sarcoidosis stage. The accumulation of activated CD4+ T-helper cells in sarcoid granulomas is responsible for the establishment of a pro-inflammatory phenotype and serves as a biomarker with good accuracy and high specificity for sarcoidosis diagnosis. As a prognostic biomarker, CD3+CD56+CD16+ (iNKT) is an independent predictor associated negatively with disease progression, being positively correlated with treatment applied by sarcoidosis stage. CD biomarker analysis, yielding predictive models with specificity for diagnosis and prognosis, is an important research tool for estimating disease progression in patients with different inflammatory response phenotypes across the stages of sarcoidosis.