Summary The aim of this study was to evaluate somatostatin receptor scintigraphy (SRS) in the staging of patients with small cell lung cancer. Prior to chemotherapy, 20 patients were investigated up to 24 h following an injection of 200 MBq 111In-octreotide. Following chemotherapy and restaging, four patients were re-evaluated. Primary tumour was detected in 18 of 23 studies, which exhibited increasing target-to-back-ground ratios over time. Lymph node metastases and distant metastases were detected in 7 of 27 and 8 of 31 sites, respectively. Thus, the overall sensitivity for detecting metastases was ess than 26%. SRS did not result in any upstaging of patients. We conclude that in patients with small cell lung cancer, functional imaging by SRS has no impact on clinical decision making.

SummaryThe aim of this study was to examine patients with long-standing Graves' ophthalmopathy using 111Inoctreotide scintigraphy. Sixteen patients with inactive ophthalmopathy of up to 114 months duration and 14 normals were investigated for 48 h following an injection of 200 MBq 111In-octreotide. No significant tracer accumulation in the orbital region could be identified in any of the patients with long-standing Graves' ophthalmopathy. The orbit to brain (O/B) ratios after 24 and 48 h were 2.39 ± 0.36 and 2.15 ± 0.44 versus 2.17 ± 0.33 and 2.20 ± 0.37 for the patients and normals, respectively (N.S.). 111In-octreotide accumulation in ophthalmopathy described in the literature may thus be a passing event limited to its active stage, which is consistent with the concept of imaging a lymphocytic infiltration. In this study, the lack of accumulation of 111In-octreotide in the orbital region during the inactive stage demonstrates an absence of somatostatin reoeptors in orbital tissue itself. Thus, in patients with inactive Graves' ophthalmopathy, there is no basis for a diagnostic approach with somatostatin.

Since verapamil has been shown to increase cellular concentrations of anthracyclines in resistant tumor cells, this study was designed to investigate the impact of verapamil on myocardial accumulation of I-123 labelled doxorubicin (DOX) and iodo-doxorubicin (IDOX) in rabbits and to estimate the risk of increasing anthracycline-related cardiotoxicity. Cardiac accumulation of both DOX and IDOX, calculated by scintigraphic means, neither confirmed major differences due to prior administration of verapamil nor an increased risk of cardiotoxicity of DOX and IDOX in combination with verapamil, respectively.

In this study an attempt was made to administer radioactive gas into the tympanic cavity of 15 otolaryngology-patients and to measure the initial gas trapping as well as the wash out from the middle ear to quantify the function of the Eustachian tube. 50 MBq of Xenon-133 were applied into the pharynx followed by Valsalva’s maneuver and the gas could successfully be traced in the tympanum of all patients. The normal right-to-left uptake ratio ranged from 2.1 to 0.5 (median: 1.0) and the normal half life from 11.5 min to 217.9 min (median: 96.2). Thus, middle ear ventilation scintigraphy proved to be an easy-to-perform and very low radiation-exposure test for evaluating Eustachian tube function.