Bile levels of carcino-embryonic antigen in patients with hepatopancreatobiliary disease.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the value of biliary carcino-embryonic antigen (CEA) in the differential diagnosis of malignant and benign hepatopancreatobiliary disease. PATIENTS: One hundred patients were prospectively studied. Benign diseases were present in 39% of the patients while 61% had malignant diseases. METHODS: Samples of serum were taken from all patients just before endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) and samples of biliary CEA were obtained during ERCP. RESULTS: The sensitivity of serum CEA and carbohydrate antigen 19-9 (CA 19-9) in detecting malignancy were 50% and 92%, respectively, while the respective specificities were 95% and 72%. The mean biliary CEA level of the benign group was significantly different from that of the malignant group (35.7 +/- 8.7 ng/ml vs 268 +/- 85.5 ng/ml), but there was considerable overlap between the two groups. With a cut-off level of 20 ng/ml, the sensitivity and specificity were 84% and 64% respectively. The mean bilirubinaemia value was significantly higher in malignant disease than in benign disease (57.4 +/- 13.9 mumol/l vs 235 +/- 19.8 mumol/l). Multidimensional analysis indicated that only bilirubinaemia (P < 109-3)) was independently predictive of malignant disease. CONCLUSION: Biliary CEA assessment seems useless in distinguished between benign and malignant causes of cholestasis.

Early radionuclide detection of intrapulmonary shunts in children with liver disease.

UNLABELLED: In order to detect and quantify intrapulmonary shunts in children with liver disease, a radionuclide method was developed and evaluated in such a population. METHODS: We studied 135 children in whom the severity of liver disease, in most cases, justified consideration of liver transplantation. Patients were separated into two groups according to their resting PaO2 values under room air: 109 children were normoxic and 26 were hypoxic. A radionuclide scan was performed immediately after intravenous injection of human albumin macroaggregates. Activity of the lungs (L) and brain (B) was counted. A shunt index (SI) was calculated as SI = 100.B/L. We compared this index with blood gases and clinical follow-up. RESULTS: In the normoxic group, SI was 0.43 +/- 0.30 (mean +/- s.d.); none of the 102 children with SI < 1 developed hypoxemia during their follow-up. Two of the six children with SI > 1 developed subsequent hypoxemia. In the hypoxic group, the nine children with SI < 1 did not aggravate their hypoxemia during follow-up. The 17 hypoxic children with SI > 1 later developed severe hypoxemia. CONCLUSIONS: Scintigraphy with intravenous human albumin macroaggregates is more accurate than measuring arterial blood gases to detect IPS in children with cirrhosis.

[Technetium TC 99m pyrophosphate myocardial scintigraphy in amyloidosis. Correlations with Doppler echocardiography]. / La scintigraphie myocardique au pyrophosphate technétié dans l'amylose. Corrélations avec l'échographie doppler cardiaque.

Technetium 99m cardiac scintigraphy as practiced at present for diagnosing amyloisodid only provides a visual semi-quantitative assessment of uptake of the isotope. To improve the diagnostic accuracy of the method, the authors evaluated prospectively a personal technique of scintigraphy quantification based on early images obtained at the 20th minute in 15 patients with neuropathic amyloidosis. Doppler echocardiographic studies indicated that 9 patients had cardiac involvement whilst 6 were free of cardiac amyloidosis. The index of isotopic uptake (ratio of cardiac/abdominal uptake) was 0.44 to 1.58 in the first group and 0.09 to 0.31 in the second group. The correlation between the scintigraphic index and interventricular septal or posterior wall thickness measured by echocardiography was poor. These results obtained in 15 patients with neuropathic amyloidosis suggest that the scintigraphic index measured at the 20th minute is discriminatory and allows identification of those patients with cardiac involvement. On the other hand, the correlations with echocardiographic wall thickness are poor. Technetium 99m cardiac scintigraphy with this technique of quantification is a useful tool for diagnosing cardiac amyloidosis, especially when echocardiography is difficult to interpret.

Follow-up thallium-201 scintigraphy after mantle field radiotherapy for Hodgkin's disease.

PURPOSE: Assessment of the long-term cardiac effects of mediastinal radiotherapy for Hodgkin's disease, by Thallium scintigraphy. METHODS AND MATERIALS: 32 patients (14 males and 18 females) who underwent mantle field radiotherapy for Hodgkin's disease were included in this study. Twenty patients received 4 fractions of 2.5 Gy per week and 12, five fraction of 2 Gy per week, delivered on alternate days. All the patients, except three, performed exercise testing electrocardiogram and Thallium-201 tomoscintigraphy. The average time interval from completion of treatment to the study was 7 years (range 3-13 years). No patients had clinical symptoms of cardiac disease. Mean age at the time of the study was 35 years (range 23-48 years). RESULTS: Two electrocardiograms revealed left bundle branch block and the patients were excluded from the study. Only one out of 27 exercise electrocardiograms was abnormal in a patient with mitral valve prolapse, who was also excluded from the study. Twenty-six scintigraphies were evaluable. Twenty-two (85%) were clearly abnormal with partial or complete redistribution on delayed images. The anterior region was affected in 19 of these cases (86%). Four explorations were undoubtedly normal. Coronary angiography was not performed for ethical reasons in these asymptomatic patients. CONCLUSION: Despite possible false positive tests, the high rate of abnormality (85%) in this small series is striking. These preliminary data justify larger studies and a close long-term follow-up of these patients.

Two antigens detected on human ocular melanomas with the mouse monoclonal antibodies 2/10SN and 10/12SN.

Seven human ocular melanoma cell lines were established in vitro and 3 of these, GU-4, LLN-40 and its subline C17-11, were characterized. Mice were immunized with these ocular melanoma cell lines, and 2 hybridomas producing monoclonal IgG1 antibodies (MAb) were produced. MAb 2/10SN recognizes a 44-kDa monomeric protein, whereas MAb 10/12SN reacts with an 83/65-kDa heterodimeric protein. These melanoma-associated antigens (MAA) are detected at high concentrations in the cytoplasm of ocular melanoma cells. However, cell-surface labelling techniques suggest that these MAA are also associated with the cell-surface membrane. These 2 ocular MAA are also expressed by several skin melanoma cell lines. Immunohistochemical studies have localized these antigens to ocular and skin melanomas, to sweat ducts and basal squamous cells in normal skin, with limited expression in several other normal tissues and some carcinomas. Biodistribution studies in nude mice with human ocular melanomas have demonstrated good localization of 125I-labeled MAb 2/10SN at the tumor sites. Therefore, these 2 MAbs, 2/10SN and 10/12SN, recognize MAA which appear to be unique and may prove useful for imaging purposes.

Myocardial perfusion damage after mediastinal irradiation for Hodgkin's disease: a thallium-201 single photon emission tomography study.

Conflicting data have been reported on the incidence of myocardial abnormalities after mediastinal irradiation for Hodgkin's disease. We studied myocardial perfusion in 31 clinically asymptomatic patients (13 male, 18 female, mean age 35 years) 7 years (range 3-11 years) after mantle field radiotherapy. Thallium-201 tomoscintigraphic data were obtained after exercise, 4 h later and at rest (8-15 days later). Images were analysed visually and quantitatively (sectorial quantification of 201Tl uptake on the bull's eye images of the short-axis slices) compared with those of 35 subjects with a low likelihood of coronary artery disease. Twenty-five tomographic data sets were available. Images were visually abnormal in 21 patients (84%) showing an heterogeneous 201Tl uptake. In 68%, the sectorial 201Tl uptake was lower than the mean 201Tl uptake value minus 2 standard deviations measured in subjects with a low likelihood of coronary artery disease. Significant redistribution (quantitatively assessed > or = 10%) was present in 10 patients (40%). In most of the patients, the location and the shape of the defect(s) could not be anatomically related to an epicardial coronary vessel disease. These results indicate that after mediastinal irradiation the 201Tl myocardial uptake is frequently abnormal. The observed patterns suggest a disease of the small coronary vessels and/or the existence of a myocardial fibrosis rather than epicardial coronary artery disease.

Diagnosis of malignancy in thyroid nodules by factor analysis of spectral and dynamic structures: a simultaneous dual-isotope dynamic study with thallium-201 and iodine-131.

The aim of this study was to identify malignant thyroid nodules using iodine-123 and thallium-201 simultaneous dynamic acquisition. The image sequences acquired were processed by factor analysis of spectral and dynamic structures (FASDS). Some 49 patients were investigated, and their diagnoses were confirmed by histological examination. Data processing enables the estimation of the spectra of the two isotopes and the evaluation of the kinetics and spatial structures related to each tracer. The superimposition of thallium and iodide sum images allowed us to delineate the nodule accurately. Two groups were defined: 21 patients who had 201Tl uptake in the nodule, and 28 who had none. In the first group, 5 nodules were carcinomas, whereas all nodules in the second group were benign. The results of the 201Tl dynamic study improved the diagnosis of carcinoma as the number of false-positive cases decreased. FASDS succeeds in extracting spectral and kinetic information, proving its usefulness in clinical diagnosis.

Biliary pain in postcholecystectomy patients without biliary obstruction. A prospective radionuclide study.

Biliary pain without obvious biliary obstruction is common in postcholecystectomy patients. We studied 20 symptomatic patients with episodes of biliary-type pain after cholecystectomy (all having undergone endoscopic retrograde cholangiography), and in 18 asymptomatic postcholecystectomy controls. We performed quantitative hepatobiliary radionuclide analysis with dimethyl-imidodiacetic acid. From a series of 90 dynamic images at 1-min intervals using a gamma camera coupled to a computer, time-activity curves were produced in regions of interest in the liver, intrahepatic biliary tree, common duct, and heart, from which quantitative biliary excretion indexes were obtained. The results demonstrate a biliary kinetic dysfunction in patients with postcholecystectomy pain without morphological abnormalities.

Significance of intra- and extrahepatic portasystemic shunting in survival of cirrhotic patients.

Survival and incidence of hemorrhage and encephalopathy were studied in 121 medically managed cirrhotic patients according to the type of naturally occurring portasystemic shunting. Three types of shunting were distinguishable using scintillation splenoportography, a method whereby morphological and hemodynamic data on portal and hepatic circulation were obtained by external detection. The three patterns were: (1) extrahepatic shunting with partial splenic blood flow diversion, (2) spontaneous total splenic blood flow diversion, and (3) intrahepatic shunting corresponding to portohepatic communications with a diameter larger than 10 mum. The probability of 4-year survival was much lower in case of portasystemic shunting (18%) than in its absence (73%, P less than 0.01). Patients with intrahepatic shunting had a survival rate not significantly different from that of patients with extrahepatic shunting. However, they had the highest incidence of hemorrhage (71%), and hemorrhage was not due to rupture of esophageal varices. The highest incidence of encephalopathy was seen in patients with total splenic blood diversion (40%), but it was not significantly different from that of other cirrhotic patients. No group of patients can be significantly identified as a high-risk group.

131I rose bengal: its use in the evaluation of infantile jaundice.

One-hundred ten 131I-rose bengal studies (RBI) were performed in infants suspected of having biliary atresia. Fecal RBI excretion of less than 10% was observed in 72 of 73 cases of extrahepatic biliary atresia, but also in 10 of 37 cases of intrahepatic cholestasis of various origins. One-hundred twenty-two RBI tests were performed in children operated on for extrahepatic biliary atresia and 71 tests were performed between postsurgical weeks 3 and 8, and 51 tests were done later. Prognostically, early tests show that fecal RBI excretion of more than 15% was observed in 2 of 34 cases who were later completely jaundice-free and in only 1 of 37 cases where no bile flow restoration occurred.

Comparative assessment of scintillation camera performance.

The performance characteristics of 5 scintillation cameras were compared: Searle 19, Searle 37, Ohio Nuclear, Picker 2C and Toshiba GCA 202. Inherent characteristics including spatial resolution, field uniformity and distortion, energy resolution, count-rate capability and paralyzing time were measured. Extrinsic characteristics such as spatial resolution with emission tests and sensitivity with high resolution, low energy collimators also were measured. The Ohio Nuclear camera gave the best results for most of the parameters studied, followed by Searle 37 PMT, Searle 19 PMT, Picker, and Toshiba. The size of the crystal must also be a criterion for choosing a camera.