In addition to etiology, ACCESS examined the socioeconomic status and clinical course of patients with sarcoidosis. Newly diagnosed cases of sarcoidosis were compared to age, sex, and race matched controls. Leads to the etiology of sarcoidosis have come from diverse sources: in clinical laboratory investigations, alveolitis has been found to precede granulomatous inflammation; in case control studies, familial aggregation has been identified; and in case reports, recurrence of granulomatous inflammation has been observed after lung transplantation.