Acute subendocardial myocardial infarction in patients. Its detection by Technetium 99-m stannous pyrophosphate myocardial scintigrams.

Eighty-eight patients admitted to a coronary care unit with chest pain of varying etiology but without ECG evidence of an acute transmural myocardial infarction had myocardial scintigrams using technetium-99m stannour pyrophosphate (99m-Tc-PYP). Seventeen of these patients had ECG and enzymatic evidence suggestive of acute subendocardial myocardial infarction. In each of these the scintigrams were postivie demonstrating increased 99m-Tc-PYP uptake either in a faintly but diffusely positive pattern or in a well-localized strongly positive one. The remaining 71 patients did not evolve ECG or enzymatic evidence of acute myocardial infarction. In each of these patients the myocardial scintigram was negative. Thus 99m-Tc-PYP myocardial scintigrams are capable of identifying the presence of acute subendocardial myocardial infarction in patients. The absolute frequency with shich subendocardial myocardial infarction can be recognized utilizing this technique will have to be established in a larger number of patients in the future.