Man-in-a-barrel syndrome: a rare presentation of giant cell arteritis.

Constantina Bounia, Zinovia Kefalopoulou, Dimitra Veltsista, Elisabeth Chroni, Stamatis-Nick C Liossis

Clinical and experimental rheumatology 2022 May

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We present herein the case of a patient with brachial plexopathy, the first manifestation of giant cell arteritis (GCA). A 71-year-old woman presented with a subacute-onset weakness of her upper extremities; the patient had an initially good clinical response to steroid treatment. However, a few weeks after steroid discontinuation, she manifested fever and fatigue and increased serum markers consistent with a systemic inflammatory response. A PET-CT scan revealed an increased uptake in the subclavian arteries and a temporal biopsy was typical for GCA. Oral administration of high dosage steroids improved the patient's clinical symptoms and normalised her inflammatory serum markers.

Citation

Constantina Bounia, Zinovia Kefalopoulou, Dimitra Veltsista, Elisabeth Chroni, Stamatis-Nick C Liossis. Man-in-a-barrel syndrome: a rare presentation of giant cell arteritis. Clinical and experimental rheumatology. 2022 May;40(4):838-840