[Angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) in sarcoidosis, tuberculosis, silicosis, and coal mining workers]

We studied the seric activity of the angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) in 19 patients with sarcoidosis, 14 tuberculosis, 16 silicosis and 15 workers of coal mining without silicosis and other concomitant diseases, in order to assess its usefulness as orientative parameter for the differential diagnosis of these processes. We found significantly increased values with respect to the control group in all of them: control group (40.84 +/- 13.06 U/l), sarcoidosis (57.77 +/- 16.47 U/l), tuberculosis (46.85 +/- 10.25 U/l), silicosis (61.50 +/- 21.40 U/l), miners (71.50 +/- 12.48 U/l). We did not detect any statistically significant differences between the several diagnostic groups except for miners and tuberculosis (p = 0.04). We conclude that this parameter is hot very useful for the diagnostic orientation of these processes.