Clinical Results of 99mTc Labelled Bleomycin Scintigraphy in Various Malignant and Benign Diseases: Comparison with 67Ga Citrate Scintigraphy

• Published in: Japanese journal of clinical oncology 1974-12, Vol.4 (2), p.133-144
• Main Authors: MORI, TORU, ODORI, TERUO, SAKAMOTO, TSUTOMU, HAMAMOTO, KEN, ONOYAMA, YASUTO, TORIZUKA, KANJI
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0368-2811; 1465-3621
• DOI: 10.1093/oxfordjournals.jjco.a039845

Scintigraphy after 99mTc bleomycin (BLM*) administration was performed on 390 patients suspected of having malignancy. In most of the cases scintigraphy after 67Ga citrate (Ga*) administration was performed simultaneously. These results were analyzed according to the location of the lesion, clinical diagnosis, histological findings, size of the lesion and effect of treatment. In 239 malignant cases, BLM* scintigraphy gave 193 (81%) positive results, while Ga* scintigraphy gave 114 positives in the 176 examinations (65%). BLM* scintigraphy was found favorable for tumors located close to the body surface, and excellent results were obtained in tumors of the thyroid, breast, extremities and face, while poor results were found in tumors of the abdominal and pelvic regions and in malignant lymphomas. On the other hand, Ga* scintigraphy gave useful information on malignant lymphomas but poor accumulation was observed generally in adenocarcinomas. Such different characters of the two scintigraphies were consistent in metastatic lesions and in follow-up studies after various treatments. In 126 cases with various benign diseases, BLM* gave 21 false positives (17%), but Ga* scintigraphy gave 35 positives in 77 cases (45%). Of note was that BLM* gave 23% positives in 53 cases with inflammatory and granulomatous changes, while Ga* gave a high 73% figure in these cases. In 25 various brain lesions, BLM* scintigraphy gave better results than 99mTc pertcchnetate scintigraphy in metastatic brain tumors and tumors located in the brain basis or the occipital region. In conclusion, BLM* scintigraphy was considered much more reliable than Ga* scintigraphy in differentiating malignant from benign diseases. However, the two materials were also found to have different characters and they were considered rather compensatory to each other. Therefore, the selection of suitable material or parallel study by both materials was considered to be commendable.