Table 4.

Previous studies on the length of superficial temporal artery biopsy (STAB)

Study	Year	Location	Study design	Number of cases	Number of biopsies	Mean biopsy length (mm)	Positivity rate (%) ${}^a$	Main finding and conclusion
Allison et al[23]	1984	UK	Retrospective review	132	132	7.9	64	Size of 7 mm is recommended for more accurate results
Kent et al[24]	1990	USA	Retrospective review	70	73	N/S	11.4	Generous biopsy of $\sim$ 5 cm of fresh vessel recommended to confirm a suspected diagnosis of temporal arteritis
Achkar et al[25]	1994	USA	Consecutive case series	535	535	36.32	33	Suggested to obtain samples $\ge$ 20 mm
Sudlow et al[26]	1997	Scotland	Retrospective review	N/S	200	9.14	27.02	Longer specimens may be more likely to yield a positive result
Taylor-Gjevre et al[27]	2005	Canada	Retrospective review	141	141	17.6	27	More positive results at post-fixation length of 10 mm
Arashvand et al[28]	2006	UK	Retrospective review	N/S	117	11.95 $\pm$ 7.91	26	Raising or lowering the minimum threshold length did not yield a statistically significant difference in the rate of positive results
Mahr et al[29]	2006	France	Retrospective review	1520	1520	13.3 $\pm$ 7.2	14.7	Biopsy sample size of 5 mm is adequate
Sharma et al[29]	2007	Australia	Retrospective observational study	157	157	11.85	N/S	Specimens of $\ge$ 20 mm were 2.8 times more likely to show features of GCA than those $<$ 20 mm
Breuer et al[31]	2009	Israel	Retrospective review	173	305	11.9	35.4	Longer samples are more accurate
Ypsilantis et al[32]	2011	UK	Cohort	966	966	10	21.4	A 10-mm sample is satisfactory (post-fixation length of $\ge$ 7 mm)
Kaptanis et al[33]	2014	UK	Retrospective review	149	151	6.4 $\pm$ 3	13.3	No relation between length and results; hence post-fixation length of 6 mm is satisfactory (biopsy length $>$ 10 mm)
Au et al[4]	2016	Australia	Retrospective observational	96	96	16 $\pm$ 7.3	20.8	Length of biopsy is not an independent factor in positivity rate
Grossman et al[34]	2016	Israel	Retrospective analysis	240	240	10.7 $\pm$ 5.7	25.83	Length of biopsy is not a determining factor
Gajree et al[35]	2017	Scotland	Retrospective analysis	715	715	11.64 $\pm$ 6.4	35	Length of specimen does not necessarily change the likelihood of a positive biopsy
Papadakis et al[36]	2017	Germany	Retrospective analysis	116	116	9.4	55.2	TAB length is not associated with the TAB diagnostic yield in patients with clinical suspicion of GCA
Oh et al[12]	2018	Australia	Retrospective case-control of consecutive cohort	538	538	17.6 $\pm$ 9.1	23.4	Biopsy length of $\ge$ 15 mm is suggested
Current study	2019	Iran	Retrospective analysis	114	114	16.05 $\pm$ 8.27	14.9	TAB length is not significantly different in positive and negative biopsies; also, the majority of TABs are negative
GCA, giant cell arteritis; N/S, not stated; TAB, temporal artery biopsy ${}^a$ Rate of positive biopsies in all biopsies