[Radiologic diagnosis of bone metastases]

The diagnostic relevance of the various radiological examination methods - skeleton scintigraphy, conventional x-ray film, computed tomography, sonography and magnetic resonance - was analysed on the basis of an examination of 4765 clinically or scintigraphically suspect skeleton segments in order to arrive at an effective but also economically justifiable diagnostic approach. Conventional skeleton scintigraphy should be employed as the first method of choice, since it has a sensitivity of 93% and is hence very suitable as a searching tool. To differentiate benign and malignant lesions it is absolutely imperative to conduct at the same time a x-ray control of any abnormal accumulation of nuclides, or of parts of the skeleton that display signs or symptoms. Conventional x-ray film diagnosis enabled correct diagnosis of the type of disease in 95% of the cases. In its capacity as a complementary examination method, computed tomography enabled correct diagnosis in 52% of the cases that had remained roentgenologically unclear. A pathological bone scintigram without any x-ray or CT correlate must be considered as being suspect of metastases if trauma is absent. Magnetic resonance proved to be the most sensitive method in identifying malignant infiltrations of the medullary space in two patients suffering from a clearly delineated pain syndrome with normal x-ray and CT findings. Sonography proved superior in detecting extraosseous tumour portions. The value of angiography is the preoperative vascular imaging of metastases of the possibility of performing therapeutic embolisation or intraarterial drug therapy.