Giant Cell Arteritis: Or something else? Differential Diagnosis

Eyes and ocular appendages (H00-H59).

  • Nonarteriitic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (AION; acute circulatory disturbance of the optic nerve head; imprecisely and colloquially also: “ocular infarction”).

Cardiovascular system (I00-I99).

  • Atherosclerosis (arteriosclerosis, hardening of the arteries).
  • Endocarditis (inflammation of the inner lining of the heart)
  • Peripheral arterial occlusive disease (pAVK) – progressive narrowing or occlusion of the arteries supplying the arms / (more often) legs, usually due to atherosclerosis (arteriosclerosis, arteriosclerosis).

Musculoskeletal system and connective tissue (M00-M99).

  • Granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA), formerly Wegener’s granulomatosis – necrotizing (tissue dying) vasculitis (vascular inflammation) of the small to medium-sized vessels (small-vessel vasculitides), which is associated with granuloma formation (nodule formation) in the upper respiratory tract (nose, sinuses, middle ear, oropharynx) as well as the lower respiratory tract (lungs)
  • Polymyositis – systemic inflammatory disease of skeletal muscle with perivascular lymphocytic infiltration.
  • Giant cell arteritis with arteritis temporalis and Takayasu arteritis – vasculitis (vascular inflammation) of large and medium-sized arteries.
  • Vasculitis, unspecified

Psyche – nervous system (F00-F99; G00-G99)

  • Headache, unspecified

Symptoms and abnormal clinical and laboratory findings not elsewhere classified (R00-R99)

  • Fever of unknown etiology