Myocardial tomography using technetium-99m-tetrofosmin to evaluate coronary artery disease.
To assess the clinical value of the 99mTc-labeled myocardial perfusion agent, 99mTc-tetrofosmin, the findings of stress and rest myocardial tomography were compared with those of stress and 3-hr delayed 201Tl tomography and coronary arteriography.


METHODS
Twenty-five patients who had coronary arteriography were studied with both stress tetrofosmin and 201Tl tomography.


RESULTS
The image quality of tetrofosmin was superior to that of 201Tl despite a shorter acquisition time. Both the tetrofosmin and 201Tl studies were quite sensitive to detect coronary artery disease (100% and 95%, respectively) (p = ns). The two studies showed similar sensitivity (75% and 73%) and specificity (80% and 77%, respectively) for the detection of significant (> or = 75% diameter) coronary artery stenosis. Stress distribution of tetrofosmin tended to be slightly higher than that of 201Tl (% uptake: 63.3% +/- 13.5% versus 60.4% +/- 12.2%, p = 0.0006; uptake score: 2.33 +/- 1.03 versus 2.22 +/- 1.07, p = 0.007), indicating less defect contrast in the former. A high concordant rate (89%) of the stress perfusion score was observed between the two radiopharmaceuticals. Reversible perfusion abnormalities were observed to be similar between stress-rest tetrofosmin and stress-delayed 201Tl studies.


CONCLUSIONS
Stress tetrofosmin perfusion tomography is a valuable method to detect coronary artery disease and to assess tissue viability with accuracy similar to that of stress 201Tl tomography.
Tamaki
N
N
Department of Nuclear Medicine, Kyoto University Faculty of Medicine, Japan.
Takahashi
N
N
Kawamoto
M
M
Torizuka
T
T
Tadamura
E
E
Yonekura
Y
Y
Okuda
K
K
Nohara
R
R
Sasayama
S
S
Konishi
J
J
D000368:Aged; D017023:Coronary Angiography; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D005080:Exercise Test; D005260:Female; D006321:Heart / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009943:Organophosphorus Compounds; D015609:Organotechnetium Compounds; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D013794:Thallium Radioisotopes; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon
D009943:Organophosphorus Compounds; D015609:Organotechnetium Compounds; D013794:Thallium Radioisotopes; C078700:technetium tc-99m tetrofosmin