Detection of esophagitis by 99mTc-methoxyisobutylisonitrile chest SPECT.
Esophagitis is a common complication of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). Unfortunately, an accurate diagnosis of esophagitis usually requires invasive endoscopy. The purpose of our study was to evaluate the use of noninvasive 99mTc-methoxyisobutylisonitrile (MIBI) chest SPECT to detect esophagitis in GERD patients.


METHODS
Forty GERD patients who underwent endoscopy for diagnosis and grading of esophagitis according to the Savary-Miller grading system were included in this study. 99mTc-MIBI chest SPECT was performed on all patients to detect and grade esophagitis.


RESULTS
On the basis of the endoscopic findings, the sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of 99mTc-MIBI chest SPECT to detect esophagitis were 100%, 77%, and 95%, respectively. The correlation between the Savary-Miller grading system and 99mTc-MIBI chest SPECT grading was found to be good.


CONCLUSIONS
Noninvasive 99mTc-MIBI chest SPECT has excellent sensitivity and good accuracy as a screen for esophagitis.
Kao
C H
CH
Department of Nuclear Medicine, Taichung Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan.
Hsieh
J F
JF
Tsai
S C
SC
Ho
Y J
YJ
Sun
S S
SS
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D004942:Esophagitis, Peptic / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D017256:Technetium Tc 99m Sestamibi; D013909:Thorax / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon
D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D017256:Technetium Tc 99m Sestamibi