[Usefulness of imaging posture using modified oblique view of the axilla (MOVA) for sentinel lymph node scintigraphy in patients with breast cancer].

Identification of the sentinel lymph nodes in patients with breast cancer is often hampered by high radioactivity from the injection site, since the distance between the injection site and regional lymph nodes is quite short in these patients. We investigated the usefulness of the modified oblique view of the axilla (MOVA) method introduced by Haigh et al., aiming at better discrimination of the target and higher resolution. Compared with the standard anterior view (SAV) of the supine position and conventional oblique view (COV) imaging, MOVA was able to obtain a longer distance between the injection site and axillary lymph nodes in 20 of 21 lymph nodes. MOVA provided more effective information for visual evaluation of the geometry of axillary lymph nodes in half the cases, and one lymph node was detected only with MOVA. In contrast, SAV provided better imaging in one patient. Although our results support the usefulness of MOVA, the combined application of MOVA and SAV is desirable, since sentinel lymph node detection with the gamma-probe is performed in the supine position during surgery.