Radiolabeled monoclonal antibody imaging (immunoscintigraphy) of colorectal cancers: current status and future perspectives.

Over the past two decades, the role of radiolabeled monoclonal antibodies has been steadily growing in clinical practice, particularly for staging and locating a variety of neoplasms. This is due largely to the availability of these products in pharmaceutical quantities as well as the relatively low incidence of adverse reactions following the intravenous administration of antibodies to patients. One particular area of oncology where radiolabeled monoclonal antibodies are most likely to play an extremely important clinical role is in the evaluation of patients with colon and rectal carcinomas. In this report, we review the current utilization of tumor-associated monoclonal antibodies in the preoperative as well as postoperative screening of patients with colorectal carcinoma.