[Contribution of Three-phase Scintigraphy to Indication of Revision Arthroplasty of the Hip Joint.].

: In the introduction of the paper the authors abalyze the problem of stable and long-term fixation of endoprostheses of the hip joint. They present statistics on the ratio of surgical revisions of endoprostheses of the hip joint in 1993-1996 which has a rising trend. In the subsequent part of the paper they deal with the problem of early diagnosis of loosening in the stage when only subjective data reported by the patient are available and the X-ray finding does not yet show signs of osteolysis and loosening of the TEP. Therefore they started to use in 1993 as a diagnostic aid three-phase all-skeletal scintigraphy. So far they used it in 18 patients with 100% reliability, as confirmed on operation. The authors describe in detail the method of three-phase scintigraphy with special emphasis on phase III. The results of scintigraphy are demonstrated on two patients. Key words: revision of endoprosthesis of the hip joint, radiopharmaceutical preparations, 99mTc-MDP, all-skeletal three-phase scintigraphy.