Update on Treatment in Cardiac Sarcoidosis

The prevalence of cardiac sarcoidosis has exponentially increased over the past decade, primarily due to increased awareness and diagnostic modalities for the disease entity. Despite an expanding patient cohort, the optimal management of cardiac sarcoidosis remains yet to be established with a significant lack of prospective trials to support current practice. Corticosteroids remain first-line treatment of this disorder, and we recommend that immunosuppressive therapy should be initiated in all patients diagnosed with cardiac sarcoidosis. Additional pharmacotherapy may be necessary based on disease manifestations and response to treatment. The use of nuclear imaging with ¹⁸fluorodeoxyglucose (¹⁸FDG) positron emission tomography (PET) to guide treatment has become more common, but lacks rigorous data from larger cohorts. Whether an improvement in inflammatory burden as assessed by ¹⁸FDG-PET is correlated with clinical outcomes is as yet unproven. Device therapy with implantable-cardioverter defibrillators should be considered in all cardiac sarcoidosis patients for either primary or secondary prevention of ventricular arrhythmias and cardiac death.