Gallium-67 as a tumor-seeking agent in lymphomas--a review

Abstract

Background: At present 67Ga can be considered one of the most widely used viability radiotracers. There is general consensus in the literature that 67Ga has the highest clinical value in the management of lymphoma patients.

Methods: We critically discuss the role of gallium scintigraphy in lymphoma patients on the basis of the experience of the Nuclear Medicine Division at the National Cancer Institute of Milan.

Results and conclusions: The sensitivity of gallium scan is very high (80-90%) in the staging and follow-up of Hodgkin's disease, and the method is also of great importance in the follow-up of lymphoma patients. We recommend scintigraphy to study the residual mediastinal mass after treatment. Our experiences during the follow-up of 189 lymphoma patients clearly showed the superior performance of gallium scan compared to MRI in the study of the mediastinal region after treatment. Sensitivity and specificity were both very high (90% and 96.9% vs 88.7% and 89.2%, respectively). Gallium scintigraphy can also be used to study the disease-free interval, post-treatment survival, early signs of recurrence and treatment response times. Comparison of the survival curves of 33 patients with diffuse large cell Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma examined at the National Cancer Institute showed a statistically significant difference (logrank test, P = 0.0125) between patients with positive and those with negative gallium scan after 4-6 cycles of chemotherapy.