Familial Kaposi's sarcoma: case reports and review of the literature

We report 4 new families with Kaposi's sarcoma, occurring in 2 members of the same family (2 pairs of brothers, uncle and nephew and father and son) in a series of 160 patients with Kaposi's sarcoma. In addition, HLA typing was also carried out for 6 of the 8 patients. A detailed review of the literature is also presented. The total number of familial cases of Kaposi's sarcoma is low (only 30 cases are described); the great majority of these cases consist of siblings and Italians.