What is the current role of nuclear cardiology in clinical medicine?

T he application of noninvasive nuclear medicine imaging techniques to the study of patients with suspected or known cardiovascular diseases offers important diagnostic, pathophysiologic and prognostic information that may directly affect patient management. The complementary nature of the functional and physiologic information obtained from nuclear cardiology examinations with the anatomic and structural information obtained from cardiac catheterization procedures has led to widespread application of these techniques. This report will provide a perspective on the current role of nuclear cardiology techniques in clinical medicine.