[Late recurrence of Horton's disease with sicca syndrome]

The authors report the case of an eighty-three-year-old woman with giant-cell arteritis who experienced recurrence five years after the withdrawal of corticosteroids which had been given for four consecutive years. This recurrence, demonstrated by arterial biopsy, was accompanied with Sjögren disease proven upon histological examination. With reference to this case-report, the various possible courses of protracted giant-cell arteritis are discussed; relapses occurring more than one year after therapy is discontinued are exceptional.