Radiopharmaceuticals for bone lesions. Imaging and therapy in clinical practice

Bone scintigraphy continues to be one of the most commonly performed procedures in nuclear medicine. The radionuclide bone scan remains an excellent modality to detect metastatic disease in patients suffering from primary malignancies. This article reviews a number of aspects of bone scintigraphy such as bone physiology, radiopharmaceuticals and uptake mechanisms. As 99mTc labelled bis(di)phosphonates are the most frequently used this article is centred around these imaging agents. In addition to diagnostic bone scintigraphy the use of various bone seeking agents has been extended to the palliative treatment of bone metastases. In this context the radiobiological characteristics of various radionuclides as 89Sr, 32p, 153Sm, 186Re and 117Sn is elucidated. In addition, the clinical efficacy for pain killing of these radionuclides is elucidated on the basis of the radiation properties of these agents. It is concluded that 89Sr and 186Re are presently the radionuclides of choice. The latter agent has a slight advantage as its imaging photons enable individual dosimetry, resulting in an optimosed application scheme.