Ss. Sun et al., Technetium-99m tetrofosmin mammoscintigraphy findings related to the expression of P-glycoprotein mediated multidrug resistance, ANTICANC R, 20(3A), 2000, pp. 1467-1470
We studied 30 patients with infiltrating ductal breast carcinomas to evalua
te the relationship between the degree of accumulation of technetium-99m te
trofosmin (Tc-TETRO) and p-glycoprotein (Pgp) expression in breast tumor ti
ssues. All of the 30 patients underwent Tc-TETRO mammoscintigraphy to calcu
late breast tumor uptake of Tc-TETRO to background (T/B), ratios before sur
gery ol biopsy. Immunohistochemical analysis was performed to determine Pgp
expression in the pathological specimens of the 30 breast tumors. The T/B
ratios were significantly lower for tumors in 12 patients with positive Pgp
expression (Group A) than for those in 18 patients with negative expressio
n (Group B) (1.20 +/- 0.12 and 1.94 +/- 0.30, p < 0.05). Our results suppor
ted the opinion that Tc-TETRO mammoscintigraphy is helpful for determining
in vivo the presence of multidrug resistance due to Pgp expression in breas
t carcinoma patients.