Correspondence
Concurrent diagnosis of giant cell arteritis and chronic lymphocytic leukemia in a temporal artery biopsy
Multiple reports have suggested an association between vasculitis and hematologic malignancies, but most have involved small or medium-sized vasculitides.1,2 Concurrent malignancies have been shown to exist in 7.4% of patients with biopsy-proven giant cell arteritis (GCA), with 45% being hematologic in nature.3 Although GCA and chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) have been shown to exist concurrently, rarely has the temporal artery biopsy (TAB) led to a simultaneous diagnosis of CLL.4–7 In this case study, we describe the unique finding of 2 simultaneous disease processes, GCA and CLL, on TAB.When a temporal artery biopsy reveals a diagnosis other than temporal arteritis: eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis
A 60-year-old male patient was seen in a community hospital for an episode of amaurosis fugax in the left eye in August 2010. His erythrocyte sedimentation rate was 100 mm/hour with mild leukocytosis of 12.9 × 109/L, a platelet count of 307 × 109/L, and a positive C-reactive protein as indicated in the lab report. A tentative diagnosis of giant cell arteritis (GCA) was suspected, and he was started on oral prednisone at 50 mg/day. Subsequently, the patient was referred to our institution for a temporal artery biopsy (TAB) to confirm the diagnosis.
