Feasibility of portable gamma camera imaging in intraoperative radioguided parathyroid adenoma identification

Novel surgical applications include radioguided procedures in parathyroidectomy operations. In order to investigate the feasibility of usage of the portable gamma camera in parathyroidectomy operations; intraoperative radioguided parathyroidectomy operation was performed in three hyperparathyroidism patients with inconclusive preoperative parathyroid scintigraphy results. Intraoperative portable gamma camera did not reveal additional benefit over gamma probe in the patients with preoperative inconclusive parathyroid scintigraphy results that have parathyroid adenomas in close proximity to the thyroid lobes. However this modality might be evaluated by future studies regarding the ability to replace frozen section analysis or quick PTH analysis in the verification of the excision of the parathyroid adenoma.