Molecular Biologic and Scintigraphic Analyses of Somatostatin Receptor-Negative Meningiomas

Somatostatin receptor scintigraphy (SRS) using 111In-octreotide has proven useful in the preoperative discrimination of expansive central nervous system lesions. Meningiomas, generally expressing human somatostatin receptor (hsst) on their surface, were detected with a sensitivity of about 100%. This finding was associated with the assumption that meningiomas lack an intact blood‐ brain barrier. However, this exclusion procedure became questionable when histologically proven meningiomas in which SRS was negative were reported. Therefore, the aim of this study was to discover why these meningiomas gave negative SRS results. Methods: Before surgery, 46 patients with 47 meningiomas underwent standard MRI and SRS. Thirty-four of these patients with 35 tumors were also examined by 99m Tcdiethylenetriaminepentaacetic acid (DTPA) brain scintigraphy.