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Preoperative nuclear scans in patients with melanoma
Author(s) -
Au Francis C.,
Maier Willis P.,
Malmud Leon S.,
Goldman Leonard I.,
Clark Wallace H.
Publication year - 1984
Publication title -
cancer
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.052
H-Index - 304
eISSN - 1097-0142
pISSN - 0008-543X
DOI - 10.1002/1097-0142(19840515)53:10<2095::aid-cncr2820531017>3.0.co;2-c
Subject(s) - medicine , melanoma , radiology , stage (stratigraphy) , biopsy , liver biopsy , metastasis , cancer , paleontology , cancer research , biology
One hundred forty‐one liver scans, 137 brain scans, and 112 bone scans were performed in 192 patients with clinical Stage 1 melanoma. One liver scan was interpreted as abnormal; liver biopsy of that patient showed no metastasis. There were 11 suggestive liver scans; three of the patients with suggestive liver scans had negative liver biopsies. The remaining eight patients were followed from 4 to 6 years and none of those patients developed clinical evidence of hepatic metastases. All of the brain scans were normal. Five patients had suggestive bone scans and none of those patients had manifested symptoms of osseous metastases with a follow‐up of 2 to 4.5 years. This study demonstrates that the use of preoperative liver, brain and bone scan in the evaluation of patients with clinical Stage 1 melanoma is virtually unproductive.