An observational study in Giant Cell Arteritis and Vasculitis, sponsored by Jewish General Hospital. Completed at 5 sites in 3 countries. Open to participants aged 50 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2025-09-02.
Sponsored by Jewish General Hospital · Observational
Giant cell arteritis (GCA) causes inflammation of the arteries and can lead to serious complications such as blindness, necessitating rapid diagnosis and treatment. Although older technology non-digital PET/CT scans are routinely used for the diagnosis of GCA in large arteries, they have not been able to reliably detect inflammation of the small arteries responsible for blindness. Recent technological advances have enabled PET/CT imaging of millimetric disease in the body, which are now able to resolve small arteries. In the proposed research study, patients who are suspected by their doctors to have GCA will undergo an ultrasound of the temporal arteries, and digital PET/CT scan after injection of radioactive glucose. Digital PET/CT scans will be interpreted for the presence of abnormal uptake in the large and small arteries, as well as for the presence of other causes of the patient's symptoms. The diagnostic accuracy of PET/CT and ultrasound will be evaluated with respect to an expert panel diagnosis of giant cell arteritis and compared. Results will be adjusted for lack of a perfect reference test using advanced statistics. The goal will be to see if digital PET/CT can become a single, integrated test to diagnose this disease.
170 studies on the registry are indexed under Giant Cell Arteritis; 48 are open to participants now.
This study's enrollment of 92 is below the median of 122 across 85 observational studies indexed under Giant Cell Arteritis.
Browse Giant Cell Arteritis studies →Jewish General Hospital is the lead sponsor of 95 studies on the registry; 11 are open to participants now.
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Patients with suspected GCA
Cranial GCA symptoms (new-onset localized headache, scalp or temporal artery tenderness, ischemia-related vision loss, masseter pain on prolonged mastication) PMR symptoms: shoulder and/or hip girdle pain associated with inflammatory stiffness.
Suspected large-vessel vasculitis based on angiography, MRA, or CTA.
Exclusion Criteria:
Patients with suspected giant cell arteritis, of which FDG PET/CT is indicated for diagnosis of large vessel involvement, will have the small cranial arteries analyzed for involvement.
Diagnostic Performance
of Digital PET/CT and DUS for the diagnosis of GCA
Time frame: 2 years
Plan to share: No
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This study is completed, as verified in Aug 2025. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.
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