Use of polyclonal IgG in HIV infection and AIDS

Nuclear Medicine should have a pivitol role to play in the investigation of patients infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Unfortunately the use of scintigraphic techniques to localise infection have not become widely used in Europe. Neither 67Ga citrate or labelled leukocytes are ideal. In a search for new agents which can be used to identify the presence of infection both 99mTc and 111In labelled polyclonal immunoglobulin-C have been investigated. It was found that 99mTc labelled polyclonal immune-globulin-G was not able to localise infection in either the chest or the abdomen. In contrast 111In labelled polyclonal immunoglobulin-G had both high sensitivity and specificity for imaging infection in HIV infected patients. If these preliminary results are confirmed immunoglobulin-G could find an important clinical application in this specialised patient group.