Clinical Presentation 65 year old woman with a history of a previous right total hip replacement performed 14 years ago. Now complaining of chronic pain in the right groin and inner thigh with a clunking sensation during walking. The orthopaedic surgeon was concerned about loosening of the hip replacement, so a bone SPECT-CT scan of…
Clinical presentation 50 year old woman with a chronic history of pain in the lower back. A bone SPECT-CT of the lumbar spine was performed. Key Findings Lumbosacral transitional vertebra (LSTV) with fused right transverse process of L5 with the sacrum. Low grade uptake in the Castellvi 2a LSTV. Intense increased uptake in the left…
SPECT-CT Knee Imaging Protocol, Interpretation, and Indications What follows is my own imaging protocol which may be different from other centres. An injection of a Tc99m phosphate compound is followed by a dynamic acquisition of both knees and blood pool phase imaging. We have recently started performing SPECT-CT during the blood pool phase instead of…
The ability to localise accurately sites of bone inflammation in the foot and ankle makes SPECT-CT an invaluable tool for many specialists in this area. Due to complex anatomy in the foot, it can sometimes be difficult to confidently diagnose the cause of pain, particularly in patients with previous trauma or chronic conditions such as…
What exactly is a whole-body SPECT-CT? A SPECT-CT scan combines the high sensitivity of a bone scan with the increased specificity of a CT scan. The SPECT-CT study improves the localisation of bone uptake and helps characterise the cause of the bone uptake more clearly. This helps improve the diagnostic accuracy of the bone scan.…
A dopamine transporter study is a nuclear medicine scan which images the dopamine transporter in the brain and is used in the diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease and Dementia with Lewy Bodies. It uses the radiopharmaceutical I123-Ioflupane commonly referred to by the trade name DaTSCANTM. Parkinson’s Disease Parkinson’s disease affects one in 500 people, mostly over…
The demand for SPECT-CT scans of the cervical and lumbar spine, has been growing over the last few years. Healthcare professionals specialising in treating mechanical back pain are realising that they can take some of the guesswork out of diagnosing inflammatory causes of back pain. SPECT-CT is an extremely sensitive test for intervertebral disc, facet…
38-year-old male long-distance runner presents with chronic pain in both lower legs, worse on the right than the left. bone scan with SPECT-CT of the lower limbs was performed. Fig 1. Planar bone scan showing intense uptake in proximal right tibia and low grade uptake in medial left tibia. Fig 2a and 2b. Focal uptake…