Related Experiment Videos
Scintigraphic diagnosis of gastrointestinal bleeding with 99Tcm-dextran
A Bhatnagar1, A K Singh, D Lahoti
1Department of Nuclear Medicine, Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences, Delhi, India.
Nuclear Medicine Communications
|October 1, 1996
Summary
Technetium-99m-dextran scintigraphy effectively diagnoses gastrointestinal blood leaks. This imaging technique shows promise for detecting GI bleeding, outperforming other methods like technetium-99m-red blood cell scintigraphy.
Area of Science:
- Nuclear Medicine
- Gastroenterology
- Diagnostic Imaging
Background:
- Intravenously administered dextran serves as a plasma expander in clinical practice.
- Accurate diagnosis of gastrointestinal (GI) blood loss is crucial for patient management.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the efficacy of technetium-99m-dextran (99Tcm-dextran) in diagnosing GI blood leaks.
- To compare 99Tcm-dextran scintigraphy with other imaging modalities for GI bleeding detection.
Main Methods:
- Twenty-one patients with suspected GI blood loss underwent 99Tcm-dextran scintigraphy.
- Results were correlated with pathological findings or 99Tcm-red blood cell (99Tcm-RBC) blood pool studies.
Main Results:
- Seventeen out of 21 patients showed positive results for GI blood leaks using 99Tcm-dextran.
- 99Tcm-dextran imaging yielded superior image quality compared to 99Tcm-RBC blood pool imaging.
- No cases presented a positive 99Tcm-RBC study with a negative 99Tcm-dextran study, indicating high sensitivity.
Conclusions:
- 99Tcm-dextran scintigraphy is a valuable tool for diagnosing GI blood loss.
- This agent demonstrates potential advantages over 99Tcm-RBC and 99Tcm-sulphur colloid scintigraphy for detecting GI bleeding.