Preoperative imaging for focused parathyroidectomy: making a good strategy even better

Surgical treatment for primary hyperparathyroidism (pHPT) has undergone a major paradigm shift during the last decades from bilateral cervicotomy with four-gland neck exploration to image-guided focused approaches. The primary objective of the present study was to compare the performances of parathyroid scintigraphy (PS), parathyroid ultrasonography (US), and the combination of both procedures for guiding a focused approach on the basis of modified interpretation criteria.

Data from 199 patients operated for apparent sporadic pHPT and evaluated with US and PS using dual-isotope (123)I/(99m)Tc-sestamibi planar pinhole and single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) acqusitions were evaluated.

A total of 127 patients underwent a focused approach and the remainder had bilateral cervicotomy. In 42 cases, a focused approach was not performed due to the absence of concordant results between US and PS for a single-gland abnormality. Four patients had persistent disease and three had recurrent disease. A localizing preoperative PS had a sensitivity of 93.3%, positive predictive value of 85.8%, negative predictive value of 73.0%, and accuracy of 83.4% for predicting uniglandular disease. Additional SPECT images accurately localize posterior adenomas that are often missed by US. Compared with PS, US had a lower sensitivity (P<0.01). Our imaging protocol also enabled diagnosis of multiglandular disease in 60.6%.

PS using a highly sensitive dual-tracer subtraction method is the most accurate technique for directing a focused approach. PS could be sufficient for directing a focused approach in the presence of a negative US in two major circumstances: posterior locations due to acquired ectopia that could be missed by US, and previous history of thyroidectomy due to interpretation difficulties.