[Value of the Doppler-ultrasonography for the diagnosis of temporal arteritis].

BACKGROUND AND

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to investigate the accuracy of color Doppler-ultrasonography (CDU) compared with biopsy for the diagnosis of temporal arteritis (TA).

PATIENTS AND METHOD: Twenty-three patients with suspected TA on the basis of clinical criteria were evaluated with CDU prior to temporal artery biopsy. The presence of a hypoechoic halo, suggesting edema of the inflamed vessel, and inflammatory stenoses were registered. Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), negative predictive value (NPV) and eficiency or global test value (GTV) were evaluated.

RESULTS

All patients completed a bilateral CDU examination of temporal arteries, and in 72% of patients the biopsy was negative for TA. When the presence of an halo in CDU examination was regarded as determinant for disease, sensitivity, specificity, PPV, NPV and GTV compared with TA histologic confirmation were 80%, 92%, 80%, 92% and 88%, respectively. When the criteria used was presence of the halo sign with or without inflammatory stenosis, the values were 100%, 77%, 62.5%, 100% and 83% respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

Because of the high sensitivity and NPV, we consider CDU as a good screening test for the diagnosis of TA.