Treatment of Polymyalgia Rheumatica and Giant Cell Arteritis: Are We Any Further Forward?

Giant cell arteritis (GCA) and polymyalgia rheumaticaare common overlapping inflammatory rheumatic diseases of unknown cause that share some clinical features and affect patients older than 50 years. The age-adjusted annual incidence of GCA is 188 to 220 cases per 1 million persons (1, 2) in the United States and the United King-dom and 290 per 1 million persons in Norway (3). The annual incidence of polymyalgia rheumatica varies from 120 per 1 million persons in Italy (4) to 1120 per million in Norway (3) and is higher in women than men. Giant cell arteritis is easier than polymyalgia rheu-matica to diagnose: Patients typically present with new, unaccustomed headache (more like head pain) that is asso-ciated with an increased erythrocyte sedimentation rate or a high C-reactive protein level. Permanent visual loss, which affects up to 15 % of patients with GCA (5), is th