Clinical applications of radiolabeled monoclonal antibodies for cancer diagnosis and therapy

In recent years, considerable experience has been accrued through the clinical applications of radiolabeled monoclonal antibodies in the diagnosis and therapy of malignant diseases, While radioimmunoscintigraphy has established its role in nuclear medicine practice, radioimmunotherapy has thus far gained limited acceptance mainly due to the low amount of radioactivity that can be targeted to the tumor and to the myelotoxicity which is typically the dose limiting factor, Remarkable high therapeutic response rates have been obtained for tumors that are refractory to other therapies through the use of locoregional administration that allows the delivery of higher radiation doses to produce cytotoxic effects. New strategies based on pretargeting techniques have shown that, unlike directly labeled antibodies, higher doses of radioactivity can be administered systemically without associated bone marrow toxicity. Pilot studies in patients with high grade gliomas, in progression after conventional treatments, have shown that this approach interferes with the progression of tumors and produces tumor regression.