[Anatomopathology of inflammatory arteriopathies. Peculiar aspects of giant cell arteritis].

The authors discuss a large series of biopsy and necropsy findings in patients with giant cell arteritis (Buerger's thromboangiitis, Horton and Takayasu's diseases), and then in patients with other forms of arteritis with an inconstant plasmodial factor, such as the Chürg and Strauss syndrome, Wegener's disease, the pseudo-sarcoidosis form of lymphomatoid granulomatosis. The histology, correlated when necessary with ain immunofluorescent study, was completed by a topographical and evolutional study of the lesions in all cases. The pathogenesis of these different forms of arteritis is discussed in the light of the ultrastructural data concerning the formation of the various types of giant cell and the methods of identification of the vascular walls.