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Radionuclide Therapy of Bone Metastases

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Nuclear Medicine Therapy

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Abstract

Bone metastases occur in many patients with solid malignancies. Up to 85 % of patients with breast, lung, and prostate cancer at autopsy have bone metastases. Around 80 % of patients with prostate carcinoma, 50 % of patients with breast carcinoma and 40 % of patients with lung carcinoma develop clinically evident osseous metastases. Nearly half of them experience bone pain [1]. Other tumors can also metastasize to bone, including those originating in the kidneys, thyroid gland, endometrium, cervix, bladder, and gastrointestinal tract. However, these tumors account for less than 20 % of patients with bone metastases. The clinical implications of bone metastases are serious. When progressive, they often affect the patients’ quality of life by contributing to bone pain, use of narcotic analgesics, pathologic fractures, hypercalcemia, nerve entrapment, spinal cord compression, anxiety, depression, and loss of mobility [2, 3].

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Dr. Christopher J. Sweeney, from the Lank Center for Genitourinary Oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute—Harvard Medical School, for reviewing the manuscript.

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  1. Department of Radiology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute/Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, 450 Brookline Avenue, DL-101, Boston, MA, 02115, USA

    Alain S. Abi-Ghanem M.D. & Katherine Zukotynski M.D.

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  1. Alain S. Abi-Ghanem M.D.
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  2. Katherine Zukotynski M.D.
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Correspondence to Alain S. Abi-Ghanem M.D. .

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  1. Tirocenter Nuclear Medicine Center, Adnan Saygun Cad. 3, Istanbul, 34340, Turkey

    Cumali Aktolun

  2. & Molecular Imaging, New York-Presbyterian Hospital, Division of Nuclear Medicine, East 68th Street 525, New York, 10065, New York, USA

    Stanley J. Goldsmith

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Abi-Ghanem, A.S., Zukotynski, K. (2013). Radionuclide Therapy of Bone Metastases. In: Aktolun, C., Goldsmith, S. (eds) Nuclear Medicine Therapy. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-4021-5_5

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