Hodgkin's disease (HD): predictive role of post-treatment gallium scintigraphy

The evolution of a HD is unpredictable for 30% of patients. The goal of this study is to find whether the gallium citrate scintigraphy performed as a treatment means is predictable for relapse or survival. A retrospective study on 58 patients afflicted with diaphragmatic HD is here reported. The regression of the tumor volume is evaluated through the TDM at the end of chemotherapy and the scintigraphy is performed at the same time. The patients are separated into two groups: group 1, gallium negative; group 2, gallium positive, at the level of initial site or in another site. The relapse risk after 1 year and the survival with a minimum - 1 year recoil after the end of any treatment are studied. We have found that all the patients presented a TDM tumoral volume regression of at least 50%. In the group 1 (44 patients) there were recorded 7/44 relapse cases (16%) in less than 1 year, with 2 deceases while all the other patients are in remission (96%); in the group 2 (14 patients) only 1/14 has not relapsed in 36 months; 13/14 patients (93%) have progressed along a 2 to 10 month delay; 5 of these patients have deceased from HD (36%), 3 remained evolutive (21%) and 6 in remission after the recovering treatment (43%). In conclusion, the Ga-67 scintigraphy used as chemotherapy is a good indicator of the stage of HD evolution