{"entity":{"id":"ga-67-citrate","kind":"drug","name":"Gallium citrate Ga-67","aka":["67Ga-citrate","Gallium Citrate Ga 67"],"tldr":"One of the oldest cancer-imaging scans still on the market: an injectable form of radioactive gallium that collects in lymphomas and some other tumours (and in infections), imaged one to five days later. It has mostly been replaced by FDG-PET but is still FDA-approved and occasionally used.","summary":"Gallium Citrate Ga 67 Injection has held FDA approval since the 1970s (NDA 017478) for demonstrating the presence and extent of Hodgkin's disease, other lymphomas and bronchogenic carcinoma, and as an aid in detecting some acute inflammatory lesions; it is currently labelled and marketed by Curium. The adult dose is 74-185 MBq (2-5 mCi) IV, with optimal images typically obtained 48 hours post-injection, though acceptable images can be acquired anywhere from 6 to 120 hours afterward given considerable inter-patient biological variability.\n\nThe label itself flags the tracer's major limitation: up to 40% false-negative rates in some pathological conditions, an inability to distinguish tumour from acute inflammation without additional studies, and poor performance in lymphocytic lymphoma specifically, which the label states is not recommended for gallium imaging. FDG-PET has substantially displaced Ga-67 citrate for lymphoma staging and for fever-of-unknown-origin workups because it offers same-day imaging, higher spatial resolution and better sensitivity; gallium scintigraphy's most durable remaining niche is spinal and musculoskeletal infection imaging (often as SPECT/CT) in settings where FDG-PET is unavailable.","status":"approved","asOf":"2026-09-22","links":[{"label":"FDA label: Gallium Citrate Ga-67 Injection (DailyMed, Curium US LLC)","url":"https://dailymed.nlm.nih.gov/dailymed/drugInfo.cfm?setid=5f670c12-cca5-4d73-8a88-241f753d1bc7"}],"tags":["legacy agent","lymphoma imaging","SPECT"],"related":["ga-67"],"indications":[],"sections":[],"technologies":["spect","spect-ct"],"targets":[],"drugs":[],"companies":["curium"],"institutions":[],"pathways":[],"terms":[],"trials":[],"people":[],"bottlenecks":[],"keyPapers":[],"journals":[],"dependsOn":[],"notes":[],"modality":"SPECT tracer","mechanism":"Free gallium ion, delivered as the citrate salt, is thought to accumulate in lysosomes and bind a soluble intracellular protein in certain viable tumours and in focal sites of infection or inflammation; the exact mechanism has never been fully characterised despite the tracer's decades of clinical use. Gallium-67 decays by electron capture with several gamma photopeaks, requiring a medium-energy collimator and triple-energy-window acquisition.","approvals":[{"region":"US","year":1976,"indication":"Demonstrating the presence and extent of Hodgkin's disease, lymphoma and bronchogenic carcinoma; aid in detecting some acute inflammatory lesions"}],"mechanismSteps":[],"dosing":{"route":"Intravenous injection","schedule":"74-185 MBq (2-5 mCi) in an average 70 kg adult; optimal imaging around 48 hours post-injection, acceptable from 6-120 hours","source":"https://dailymed.nlm.nih.gov/dailymed/drugInfo.cfm?setid=5f670c12-cca5-4d73-8a88-241f753d1bc7"},"toxicity":[],"access":[],"regulatoryEvents":[]},"route":"/drugs/ga-67-citrate/","neighbours":{"isotope":[{"id":"ga-67","kind":"isotope","name":"Gallium-67","route":"/isotopes/ga-67/"}],"technology":[{"id":"spect","kind":"technology","name":"SPECT & bone scan","route":"/technologies/spect/"},{"id":"spect-ct","kind":"technology","name":"SPECT/CT","route":"/technologies/spect-ct/"}],"company":[{"id":"curium","kind":"company","name":"Curium","route":"/companies/curium/"}]}}