A different scintigraphic approach to evaluate the glomerular filtration rate.

Objective: Multiple nuclear medicine techniques for measuring renal glomerular filtration rate (GFR) are available but some of them are not practical in daily routine use and others have some accuracy issues. Hence the aim of the study was to design a new camera-based approach to measure the GFR and to compare our results with other measured GFR (mGFR) and estimated GFRs (eGFRs) derived from available measurements and equations used in daily clinical practice.

Material And Methods: 34 patients were included in the study. ∼74MBq (2mCi) Technetium 99m diethylene-triamine-pentaacetic acid (Tc-DTPA) was administered to the patients during 5min. A simple formula based on a dilution principle was used to measure GFR (ScinGFR).

Results: Our formula provided similar mGFR results in narrower range as creatinine clearance did and our results correlated well with results derived from other equations. When ScinGFR values were compared to others, there was a significant difference among them (p=0.031) due to difference between the ScinGFR and Cockroft-Gault. When the results of the ScinGFR compared to others without Cockroft-Gault, the difference among them was not significant (p=0.164).

Conclusion: A simple formula considering the extracellular fluid volume was used to predict the split and global kidney functions and despite some discrepancies, good correlation among our results and those derived from available formulas was detected.