Radiographs of suspicious secondary lesions were reviewed and placed into four separate categories: benign lesions; no lesion seen on radiographs; subtle radiographic changes suggestive of, but not conclusive for, metastasis; and metastatic lesions highly suspected on radiographs. Three hundred and ninety-nine dogs were evaluated by technetium nuclear scanning for suspected osteosarcoma.
Three hundred and twenty-six of 399 dogs (82%) had only one apparent site on the nuclear scan, whereas 72 dogs (18%) had more than one suspicious site on the nuclear scans. Highly suspected secondary metastatic lesions were detected by nuclear scans in 7.8% of cases.
Although interpretation of nuclear scans is subjective, this study showed a 7.8% chance of detecting unsuspected osseous metastasis with nuclear scans in canine osteosarcoma patients on initial presentation.
Source: Jankowski, M. K., Steyn, P. F., Lana, S. E., Dernell, W. S., Blom, C. M., Uhrig, J. L., Lafferty, M. & Withrow, S. J. (2003): Nuclear scanning with 99mTc-HDP for the initial evaluation of osseous metastasis in canine osteosarcoma. In: Veterinary and Comparative Oncology 1 (3), 152-158.
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