Skeletal scanning in neoplastic disease

Bone imaging techniques are a sensitive and accurate method for the detection of primary and secondary neoplastic disease of the skeleton. Such procedures have been demonstrated to be superior to evaluation via blood chemistry levels or routine skeletal radiographic surveys. These techniques are also helpful in establishing sites for biopsy and for objective evaluation of therapeutic modalities. They suffer the disadvantage of being nonspecific, and as a result, all positive areas identified by scanning techniques should be correlated with radiographic changes.