title: Evolving role of positron emission tomography in the management of patients with inflammatory and other benign disorders.
abstract: Fluoro-2-deoxyglucose (FDG) positron emission tomography (PET) has evolved from a research imaging modality assessing brain function in physiologic and pathologic states to a pure clinical necessity. It has been successfully used for diagnosing, staging, and monitoring a variety of malignancies. FDG-PET imaging also is evolving into a powerful imaging modality that can be effectively used for the diagnosis and monitoring of a certain nononcological diseases. PET has been shown to be very useful in the diagnosis of osteomyelitis, painful prostheses, sarcoidosis, fever of unknown etiology, and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. Based on recent observations, several other disorders, such as environment-induced lung diseases, atherosclerosis, vasculitis, back pain, transplantation, and blood clot, can be successfully assessed with this technique. With the development and the introduction of several new PET radiotracers, it is expected that PET will secure a major role in the management of patients with inflammatory and other benign disorders.
authors.affiliation: Division of Nuclear Medicine, Department of Radiology, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA.
authors.forename: Ghassan
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: El-Haddad
authors.forename: Hongming
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zhuang
authors.forename: Naresh
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Gupta
authors.forename: Abass
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Alavi
mesh_terms: D001424:Bacterial Infections / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18; D006801:Humans; D007239:Infections / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D007249:Inflammation / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D049268:Positron-Emission Tomography / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians'; D011379:Prognosis; D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D012720:Severity of Illness Index
chemical_list: D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18