Temporal Artery Biopsy: Review of 36 Patients

Abstract

ABSTRACT Aim: Temporal arteritis is a systemic vasculitis that affects large and medium sized vessels. Vasculitis signs have to be shown for accurate diagnosis; hence temporal artery biopsy is still the gold standard for diagnosis. In this study, we evaluated the patients in whom temporal artery biopsies were performed. Material Methods: In between September 2004 and June 2014, we peformed temporal artery biopsy in 36 patients, who had temporal arteritis complaints. Patients were retrospectively evaluated for their clinical properties, performed procedures and their results. Results: Thirty-six patients were enrolled into study, who were referred to our clinic for temporal artery biopsy. Of these, 11 (30.5%) were male, 25 were female (69.5%) and mean age was 61.1 (range between 56-81) years. Mean erythrocyte sedimentation rate was 56.3 mm/hr (range between 51-130). In our study, 7 (19.4%) patients had concordant findings which were representative of temporal arteritis. As a complication, only one patient had ecchymosis on the right orbital region that lasted in one week. Conclusion: Different results are published in the literature for positivity rates of temporal artery biopsies. A number of different factors such as atypical symptoms, skip lesions, suboptimal sampling and ongoing steroid treatment affect the results. Temporal artery biopsy is an easily-performed and reliable diagnostic method if only made after accurate clinical evaluation and if adequate sampling was made in early period.