Radioimmunodetection of cancer of gastrointestinal tract and liver metastasis with I-131 anti-CEA and I-131 anti-CA19-9 monoclonal antibody cocktail (IMACIS-1)

Retooling a Blood-Based Biomarker: Phase I Assessment of the High-Affinity CA19-9 Antibody HuMab-5B1 for Immuno-PET Imaging of Pancreatic Cancer

PURPOSE

In patients with cancer who have an abnormal biomarker finding, the source of the biomarker in the bloodstream must be located for confirmation of diagnosis, staging, and therapy planning. We evaluated if immuno-PET with the radiolabeled high-affinity antibody HuMab-5B1 (MVT-2163), binding to the cancer antigen CA19-9, can identify the source of elevated biomarkers in patients with pancreatic cancer.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

In this phase I dose-escalating study, 12 patients with CA19-9-positive metastatic malignancies were injected with MVT-2163. Within 7 days, all patients underwent a total of four whole-body PET/CT scans. A diagnostic CT scan was performed prior to injection of MVT-2163 to correlate findings on MVT-2163 PET/CT.

RESULTS

Immuno-PET with MVT-2163 was safe and visualized known primary tumors and metastases with high contrast. In addition, radiotracer uptake was not only observed in metastases known from conventional CT, but also seen in subcentimeter lymph nodes located in typical metastatic sites of pancreatic cancer, which were not abnormal on routine clinical imaging studies. A significant fraction of the patients demonstrated very high and, over time, increased uptake of MVT-2163 in tumor tissue, suggesting that HuMab-5B1 labeled with beta-emitting radioisotopes may have the potential to deliver therapeutic doses of radiation to cancer cells.

CONCLUSIONS

Our study shows that the tumor antigen CA19-9 secreted to the circulation can be used for sensitive detection of primary tumors and metastatic disease by immuno-PET. This significantly broadens the number of molecular targets that can be used for PET imaging and offers new opportunities for noninvasive characterization of tumors in patients.

Effect of radioimmunoscintigraphy on the management of recurrent colorectal cancer

BACKGROUND

Radioimmunoscintigraphy (RIS) is being used increasingly as a new investigation in the diagnosis of recurrent colorectal cancer. This study assessed the efficacy of 99mTc-radiolabelled PR1A3 scanning in a cohort of patients with possible recurrent colorectal cancer and the effects of scan interpretation on subsequent clinical management.

METHODS

The scans and case notes of patients scanned over a 3-year period were reviewed.

RESULTS

Forty-seven scans in 40 patients were available for analysis. In 39 instances in which scan interpretation could be verified accurately, sensitivity for recurrent colorectal cancer was 22 of 23 (96 per cent), specificity for recurrent colorectal cancer was eight of 16 (50 per cent), positive predictive value for recurrence was 22 of 30 (73 per cent) and negative predictive value for recurrence was eight of nine (89 per cent). In 16 of the 40 patients, scan interpretation strengthened a management decision or altered management. This was beneficial to ten patients and possibly detrimental to six.

CONCLUSION

This study demonstrated that RIS is sensitive in the detection of recurrent colorectal cancer and benefited the patient in one-quarter of cases. For the majority of patients, accurate detection of recurrent disease cannot be followed by curative therapy, but there is an important subgroup of patients in whom RIS alters management beneficially. However, a randomized prospective study is needed to confirm this.

Use of spiral and non-spiral computed tomography arterial portography in the detection of potentially malignant liver masses

The present study assesses the usefulness of computed tomography (CT) arterial portography (CTAP) in detecting and defining the number and anatomy of potentially malignant liver lesions. One hundred and one adults studied in 1993 and 1994 were retrospectively reviewed, including patients with primary or secondary tumours for possible resection and patients with non-hepatic malignancies in whom the detection of liver metastases would preclude surgery. Twenty-three patients underwent non-spiral CT studies and 78 had studies on a spiral unit, with 22 of these having single phase and 56 having dual phase studies to overcome artefact problems. The relationship between lesion size and detection sensitivity is critical. On non-spiral studies, the overall lesion detection sensitivity and positive predictive value was 69 and 90%, respectively. Detection sensitivity was 100 and 20% for lesions > 1 cm and < 1 cm, respectively. On single phase spiral CTAP the overall detection sensitivity and positive predictive value was 80 and 66%, respectively. Detection sensitivity for lesions > 1 cm and < 1 cm was 100 and 0%, respectively. On dual phase spiral CTAP the overall detection sensitivity and positive predictive value was 76 and 71%, respectively. For lesions > 1 cm and < 1 cm the sensitivity was 81 and 55%, respectively. Eighteen patients with non-hepatic malignancies with unsuspected metastatic spread did not proceed to major surgery because of liver metastases detected on CTAP. Perfusion artefacts occurred in 30 and 64% of non-spiral and of initial portal venous spiral CTAP studies, respectively. By using the double-phase technique, these artefacts were substantially diminished. In conclusion, CTAP is a valuable tool for assessing the presence, site and size of possible liver tumours and confers a benefit even when previous ultrasound and conventional CT have already been used. In addition, CTAP has a lower limit of useful resolution of approximately 1 cm. Perfusion artefacts can be reduced by a dual phase protocol.