Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2012 Mar;46(1):75-80.
doi: 10.2478/v10019-012-0013-3. Epub 2012 Feb 6.

Efficacy of high-energy collimator for sentinel node lymphoscintigraphy of early breast cancer patients

Kamran Aryana  1 , Mohaddeseh Gholizadeh, Mehdi Momennezhad, Maryam Naji, Mohsen Aliakbarian, Mohammad Naser Forghani, Ramin Sadeghi
Affiliations

Efficacy of high-energy collimator for sentinel node lymphoscintigraphy of early breast cancer patients

Kamran Aryana et al. Radiol Oncol. 2012 Mar.

Abstract

Introduction: Lymphoscintigraphy is an important part of sentinel node mapping in breast cancer patients. Sometimes star shaped artefacts due to septal penetration can be problematic during imaging. In the current study, we evaluated the possibility of high energy (HE) collimators use for lymphoscintigraphy.

Patients and methods: Twenty patients with early breast carcinoma were included. Thirty minutes after radiotracer injection (99mTc-antimony sulphide colloid), anterior and lateral images were acquired using a dual head gamma camera equipped with a parallel hole low energy high resolution (LEHR) collimator on one head and HE collimator on another head. All images were reviewed by two nuclear medicine specialists regarding detectability and number of axillary sentinel nodes and presence of star artefact.

Results: All images taken by LEHR collimators showed star artefact of the injection site. No image taken by HE collimator showed this effect. In two patients the sentinel node was visible only by HE collimator. Tumour location in both of these patients was in the upper lateral quadrant and both had history of excisional biopsy. In two patients additional sentinel node was visible adjacent to the first one only on the LEHR images.

Conclusions: HE collimators can be used for sentinel lymph node mapping and lymphoscintigraphy of the breast cancer patients. This collimator can almost eliminate star-shaped artefacts due to septal penetration which can be advantageous in some cases. However, to separate two adjacent sentinel nodes from each other LEHR collimators perform better.

Keywords: HEAP; LEHR; collimator; high energy all purpose; low energy high resolution; lymphoscintigraphy; sentinel node.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Disclosure: No potential conflicts of interest were disclosed.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Low energy high resolution collimator (LEHR) (upper row) as well as high energy (HE) collimator (lower row) images of a patient. Scatterograms are also shown on the right sides of each original image. There is no star shape artefact in the HE collimator images.
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Low energy high resolution collimator (LEHR) (upper row) as well as high energy (HE) collimator (lower row) images of a patient. Note that the sentinel node is only visible on the HE collimator images (arrow) due to star artefact on the low energy collimator imaging. The scatterograms are also shown on the left side of each original image.
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
High energy (HE) collimator (A) as well as low energy high resolution collimator (B) images of the same patient. Note that two separate sentinel nodes are obvious on the low energy high resolution images. These two sentinel nodes are not shown as discrete nodes on the HE collimator images.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Eftekhari M, Beiki D, Fallahi B, Arabi M, Memari F, Gholamrezanezhad A, et al. Assessment the diagnostic accuracy of sentinel lymph nodes lymphoscintigraphy using Technetium-99m phytate in breast cancer. DARU J Pharm Sci. 2009;17:83–7.
    1. Rucigaj TP, Leskovec NK, Zunter VT. Lymphedema following cancer therapy in Slovenia: a frequently overlooked condition? Radiol Oncol. 2010;44:244–8. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Buscombe J, Paganelli G, Burak ZE, Waddington W, Maublant J, Prats E, et al. Sentinel node in breast cancer procedural guidelines. Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging. 2007;34:2154–9. - PubMed
    1. Sadeghi R, Forghani MN, Memar B, Rajabi Mashhadi MT, Dabbagh Kakhki VR, Abdollahi A, et al. How long the lymphoscintigraphy imaging should be continued for sentinel lymph node mapping? Ann Nucl Med. 2009;23:507–10. - PubMed
    1. Lemstra C, Broersma M, Poot L, Jager PL. Sentinel node detection in patients with breast cancer: low-energy all-purpose collimator or medium-energy collimator? Clin Nucl Med. 2004;29:609–13. - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources