Organ and tissue uptake and retention of Sn-117m(4+)DTPA were studied in a human subject treated for metastatic bone pain, and the results were compared with the biodistribution studies in five normal mice. The explanted organs from a patient who received a therapy dose of 18.6 mCi (688.2 MBq) Sn-117m(4+)DTPA and who died 47 days later were imaged with a gamma-camera, and tissue samples were counted and also autoradiographed. Bone, muscle, liver, fat, lungs, kidneys, spleen, heart and pancreas tissue samples were assayed in a well counter for radioactivity. Regions of interest were drawn over bone and major organs to calculate and quantify clearance times using three in vivo Sn-117m(4+)DTPA whole-body scintigrams acquired at 1, 24 and 168 h after injection. Five normal mice injected with the same batch of Sn-117m(4+)DTPA as used for the human subject were sacrificed at 24 h, and tissue samples were collected and assayed for radioactivity for comparison with the human data. For the human subject, whole-body retention at 47 days postinjection was 81% of the injected dose, and the rest (19%) was excreted in urine. Of the whole-body retained activity at 47 days, 82.4% was in bone, 7.8% in the muscle and 1.5% in the liver, and the rest was distributed among other tissues. Gamma-ray scintigrams and electron autoradiographs of coronal slices of the thoracolumbar vertebral body showed heterogeneous metastatic involvement with normal bone between metastatic lesions. There was nonuniform distribution of radioactivity even within a single vertebral body, indicating normal bone between metastatic lesions. Lesion-to-nonlesion ratios ranged from 3 to 5. However, the osteoid-to-marrow cavity deposition ratio, from the microautoradiographs, was 11:1. The peak uptake in the human bone was seen at 137 h with no biological clearance. Soft tissues showed peak uptake at 1 h and exhibited three compartmental clearance components. Whole-body retention in normal mice was 38.7% of the injected dose at 24 h and the rest was excreted. At 24 h postinjection, bone in mice showed 84.2% of the whole-body retention, muscle 1.7% and liver 1.4%, and the rest was distributed in other soft tissues. Percent distribution of the retained dose among bone, muscle, liver and other soft tissues is very similar between mice and a human subject. To calculate precise radiation absorbed doses from bone pain palliation radionuclides, it is necessary to take into account soft-tissue uptake and retention that may not be readily evident from routine external gamma-scintigraphy.