Temporal Arteritis

[Amberita70]

I have been getting severe headaches over the right temple region.  It is painful to the touch and I will also get pain up onto my scalp.  I have been dealing with vertigo since the beginning of January with the headaches off and on in the beginning.  For about the last month to 6 weeks the headaches have been constant. I have also had eye floaters that don't seem to go away.  I have joint pain and other issues with inflammation and have noticed when the joints are worse so are the symptoms of temporal arteritis.  The eye floaters are worse then also. I had a temporal artery biopsy a couple weeks ago.  Originally the result came back and said no artery found.  Since then it was revised and said no artery found but there was a vein.  It said no inflammation was found in the vein though.  "Right temple area, biopsy of right temporal arteryNo
artery identified
Dilated vein with no inflammation identified"
When my pcp suspected this he put me on prednisone.  It helped a ton with the headaches and the vertigo.  He sent me to the internist in town and he also suspected temporal arteritis and sent me to get the biopsy.  An eye surgeon is the one who did the biopsy and insists there is no way it is this because I am not old enough.  I am 47.  My sed rate was only slightly elevated.  The eye Dr had me taper off the prednisone because he was worried it would affect the biopsy.  When I quit the prednisone all the symptoms came back.  

Will a vein be sufficient for a biopsy?  Is there a separate disease that would cause the same symptoms that prednisone would help?

[still_here]

Wow, I have some if these symptoms. Dizzy, aches around my temples. The dermo said she didn't feel I had that when I told her I suspected it because of two ridgelike lumps I found on my scalp. She said I'd have severe pain. Which I dont, just pressure mostly in temple area. I don't have vision problems..just occassionally blurring. I read that with temporal arteritis the hip can get aches due to arthritis which somehow goes along with it. My hip aches while in bed, more like a muscle tho. So I just don't know. If I do get pain tho, I will get biopsy, which they said they needed to do on both sides cuz sometimes it won't show up on one side. Please keep informed and keep us updated. This can be very scary. I did notice some of my face aches left when on a nasal steroid spray..Sinuses do cause many of these symptoms as well...