[A case of small cell lung cancer occurring in a patient with pulmonary sarcoidosis]

A 62-year-old man was diagnosed as having sarcoidosis on the basis of uveitis, and the findings of bronchial alveolar lavage and transbronchial lung biopsy, in April 1988. He was admitted to hospital in September 1990, because of left hemiplegia. The chest X-ray film on admission revealed a new mass shadow in the left S6 and some increase of nodular shadows in both lung fields. A bronchial biopsy from the left B6 bronchus revealed small cell lung cancer. Although he was treated with whole brain irradiation and combination chemotherapy, he died of respiratory failure after three months. Speculations about the association between sarcoidosis and lung cancer have been made, but the mechanism is not understood, and their co-existence in the same patient is rare.