Diagnostic value of technetium-99m methoxyisobutyl isonitrile (99mTc-MIBI) scintigraphy in detecting thyroid cancer metastases: a critical evaluation.

Technetium-99m methoxyisobutyl isonitrile (99mTc-MIBI) scintigraphy has recently been used in clinical application for detecting thyroid cancer metastases, its role being considered supplementary to serum thyroglobulin (Tg) measurements and radioactive iodine (131I) whole-body scans (WBS). The present retrospective study was designed to elucidate the role of 99mTc-MIBI scans in localizing metastatic lesions by assessing sensitivity and specificity of the scan results obtained in a group of 68 thyroidectomized thyroid cancer patients. Presence or absence of thyroid cancer was judged with other diagnostic modes including serum Tg measurements, 131I WBS, bone scans, chest x-rays, computed tomography (CT), ultrasonography, histopathology, and evolution of disease during follow-up. All scans were read on lesion basis for detecting neck, lung, and bone metastases and also on region basis, namely head-neck, chest, and abdomen-pelvis-extremities (ab-p-ex) areas. The sensitivity of detection was 94.4% (17/18) for neck, 78.4% (40/51) for lung, and 92.8% (64/69) for skeletal lesions. Positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV) were 96.3% (26/27) and 97.7% (43/44) for head-neck; 94.7% (71/75) and 50.0% (12/24) for chest; 100.0% (25/25) and 93.1% (54/58) for ab-p-ex regions, respectively. For all scan sites taken together, PPV and NPV were 96.1% (122/127) and 86.5% (109/126), respectively. In conclusion, the present study reveals that 99mTc-MIBI can be proposed as a first-line diagnostic agent for the follow-up protocol of thyroid cancer patients, although the ability to detect small lung metastases is somewhat limited.