The British Journal of Rheumatology, Vol 36, 251-254, Copyright © 1997 by British Society for Rheumatology
C Font, MC Cid, B Coll-Vinent, A Lopez-Soto and JM Grau
The objective was to determine associated clinical findings in patients
with visual loss due to giant cell arteritis (GCA) by means of a record
review of 146 patients with biopsy-proven GCA. Twenty-three (15.75%)
patients had lost vision. All of these patients complained of classical GCA
cranial symptoms for an average of 1.3 months, 34.8% had an apparent
isolated polymyalgia rheumatica for an average of 10.8 months and 65.2% had
premonitory visual symptoms before visual loss for an average of 8.5 days.
A clear delay in diagnosis and treatment was present in 15 patients (65.2%)
who complained of at least two classical cranial symptoms for longer than 3
weeks and/or who had presented premonitory visual symptoms for longer than
72 h before blindness. Two additional patients lost vision while receiving
standard steroid therapy. In conclusion, a high proportion of patients with
permanent visual loss have a delayed diagnosis and treatment. A wider
recognition of the disease would potentially reduce the prevalence of
irreversible visual loss among GCA patients.
ORIGINAL PAPERS
Clinical features in patients with permanent visual loss due to biopsy- proven giant cell arteritis
Department of Internal Medicine, Hospital Clinic i Provincial, University of Barcelona, Spain.
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