Clinical applications of Ga-67 DFO-DAS-fibrinogen.

As a result of our preliminary study which confirmed the safety and promising clinical usefulness of 67Ga-DFO-DAS-fibrinogen, scintigrams were taken on seven patients with suspected thrombosis. No evidence of radioactivity accumulation was found in the sites of suspected thrombi. However, in one patient accumulation of 67Ga-fibrinogen was observed in thrombi localized in the obstructed internal shunt for hemodialysis. A photon-deficient area corresponding to a gigantic thrombus in the left atrium was seen in an early 67Ga-fibrinogen image in a patient with mitral stenosis. Accumulation of radioactivity in the atrial thrombus was not observed in a later image. The necessity of performing 67Ga-fibrinogen scintigraphy in the acute phase of thrombus formation is discussed. The promising usefulness of 67Ga-fibrinogen for the early detection of thrombus formation in internal shunts for hemodialysis is also emphasized.