title: Iodine-123 metaiodobenzylguanidine myocardial imaging in patients with pulmonary hypertension.
abstract: Iodine-123-metaiodobenzylguanidine [123I-MIBG] has been used to evaluate the cardiac sympathetic nervous system. We evaluated the effect of pulmonary hypertension on the sympathetic neuronal function of the left ventricle in patients with pulmonary hypertension. We studied 20 patients with either chronic lung disease or pulmonary vascular disease. The patients were divided into a pulmonary hypertensive group and a control group. Single photon emission tomography was performed in the resting state 15 min and 4 h after administration of 123I-MIBG. Regions of interest (ROI) were set in the left ventricular (LV) free wall, the interventricular septum (IVS) and outside the LV free wall on short-axis images. The washout rate and the ROI/LV uptake ratio were calculated in each ROI. The IVS:LV uptake ratio was significantly lower in the pulmonary hypertensive group than in the control group. Our results suggest that left heart sympathetic neuronal dysfunction initially occurs in the IVS before it involves the LV free wall subsequently.
authors.affiliation: Second Department of Internal Medicine, Nagasaki University, School of Medicine, Japan.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Morimitsu
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Miyahara
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sonoda
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kohno
mesh_terms: D019797:3-Iodobenzylguanidine; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006976:Hypertension, Pulmonary / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D007462:Iodobenzenes; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009474:Neurons / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D013564:Sympathetic Nervous System / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon; D018487:Ventricular Dysfunction, Left / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*
chemical_list: D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D007462:Iodobenzenes; D019797:3-Iodobenzylguanidine