Early Scintigraphic Diagnosis of Bone Stress and Fractures in Athletic Adolescents

Abstract

A study of radionuclide bone scintigraphy in adolescents was conducted to evaluate the pattern of stress-related abnormalities and their correlation with both symptoms and roentgenography. In 26 episodes of stress-related abnormal scintigraphy, 12 (46%) had a multifocal pattern of abnormalities. Forty foci were identified by scintigraphy, with 11 (28%) exhibiting abnormal roentgenograms. These multiple abnormalities were frequently unsuspected clinically, and studies limited to symptomatic areas would have failed to detect them. It is recommended that patients with stress-related symptoms be screened utilizing radionuclide bone scintigraphy to facilitate the early detection of abnormalities in bone prior to the development of cortical disruption, thereby preventing increased morbidity and possible disabling sequelae.

Conservative treatment of lumbar spondylolysis in young soccer players

“…In addition, it was found that the longer the symptoms of spondylolysis were present, the greater the likelihood to need surgery to treat this condition [1, 2]. For early diagnosis of spondylolysis, it has been recommended to perform a SPECT scintigraphy as soon as stress‐related symptoms do appear in young soccer players with normal plain radiographs [13, 15, 21]. Particularly, SPECT scintigraphy has been recommended over planar bone scintigraphy because the former has a higher sensitivity to detect spondylolysis and improves accuracy of anatomic localization of the defect [3, 22].…”