Nuclear medicine in primary breast cancer imaging.

The application of nuclear medicine techniques to study patients with breast cancer has recently raised its profile, particularly in the investigation 'indeterminate mammographic lesions'. This review briefly points out some of the difficulties encountered with other more conventional imaging modalities and describes the radionuclide techniques most frequently employed in the investigation of those patients with breast cancer. Both planar and single photon emission tomography methods are discussed including the use of monoclonal antibodies, perfusion ligands, receptor binding hormones and other specific radiotracers, non-specific tumour markers, as well as deoxyglucose and other amino acids labelled with positron emitting radionuclides. Copyright 2002 The Royal College of Radiologists.