Against the background of a steadily growing proportion of elderly individuals within the populations in the Western countries, arteritis temporalis with its wide diversity of presenting symptoms in the elderly patient, including purely psychiatric ones, has become a disease of increasing interest to the medical profession. Increasing demands may be made on the surgeon, often a plastic surgeon, responsible for carrying out the biopsy that is necessary in arteritis temporalis for both diagnostic and therapeutic reasons. Attention is called to certain elements of risk inherent in taking a biopsy of an artery under local anaesthesia, and to the fact that the administration of ergotamine tartrate may provoke serious complications in this particular disease.