Nuclear medicine's role in infection and inflammation

Nuclear medicine imaging techniques can help in patient evaluation where infectious and non-infectious inflammatory disorders are suspected. When selected and tailored to the clinical situation, most techniques already in use or available soon provide information with high sensitivity. However, almo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inThe Lancet (British edition) Vol. 354; no. 9180; pp. 765 - 770
Main Authors Corstens, Frans HM, van der Meer, Jos WM
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published London Elsevier Ltd 28.08.1999
Lancet
Elsevier Limited
Subjects
Biological and medical sciences
Diagnosis, Differential
Endocrine glands. Genital system. Mammary gland
Fever of Unknown Origin - diagnostic imaging
Health care
Humans
Infection - diagnostic imaging
Infections
Inflammation - diagnostic imaging
Investigative techniques, diagnostic techniques (general aspects)
Medical imaging
Medical research
Medical sciences
Radionuclide Imaging
Radionuclide investigations
Sensitivity and Specificity
Surgical Wound Infection - diagnostic imaging
Radionuclide study
Human
Infection
Nuclear medicine
Inflammation
Diagnosis
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Summary:Nuclear medicine imaging techniques can help in patient evaluation where infectious and non-infectious inflammatory disorders are suspected. When selected and tailored to the clinical situation, most techniques already in use or available soon provide information with high sensitivity. However, almost all currently available techniques lack the specificity to discriminate between infectious and non-infectious inflammation. In undiagnosed fever, this non-specificity may be an advantage since fever of unknown origin is caused by infection in only about 25% of cases, but in the postoperative patient the reliable differentiation between infection and sterile inflammation is highly relevant to clinical management. The range of radiopharmceuticals to investigate infectious and non-microbial inflammatory disorders is expanding and developments in protein/peptide chemistry and in labelling technology should lead to agents with very high specific activities. Nuclear medicine has to add specificity to its already high sensitivity if it is to distinguish both categories of inflammatory disorder.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-3
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ObjectType-Review-1
ISSN:0140-6736
1474-547X
DOI:10.1016/S0140-6736(99)06070-5