title: Imaging prostate cancer with 11C-choline PET/CT.
abstract: The ability of 11C-choline and multimodality fusion imaging with integrated PET and contrast-enhanced CT (PET/CT) was investigated to delineate prostate carcinoma (PCa) within the prostate and to differentiate cancer tissue from normal prostate, benign prostate hyperplasia, and focal chronic prostatitis.
  
  
  METHODS
  All patients with PCa gave written informed consent. Twenty-six patients with clinical stage T1, T2, or T3 and biopsy-proven PCa underwent 11C-choline PET/CT after intravenous injection of 1,112 +/- 131 MBq 11C-choline, radical retropubic prostatovesiculectomy, and standardized prostate tissue sampling. Maximal standardized uptake values (SUVs) of 11C-choline within 36 segments of the prostate were determined. PET/CT results were correlated with histopathologic results, prostate-specific antigen (PSA), Gleason score, and pT stage.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The SUV of 11C-choline in PCa tissue was 3.5 +/- 1.3 (mean +/- SD) and significantly higher than that in prostate tissue with benign histopathologic lesions (2.0 +/- 0.6; P < 0.001 benign histopathology vs. cancer). Visual and quantitative analyses of segmental 11C-choline uptake of each patient unambiguously located PCa in 26 of 26 patients and 25 of 26 patients, respectively. A threshold SUV of 2.65 yielded an area under the receiver-operating-characteristic (ROC) curve of 0.89 +/- 0.01 for correctly locating PCa. The maximal 11C-choline SUV did not correlate significantly with PSA or Gleason score but did correlate with T stage (P = 0.01; Spearman r = 0.49).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  11C-Choline PET/CT can accurately detect and locate major areas with PCa and differentiate segments with PCa from those with benign hyperplasia, chronic prostatitis, or normal prostate tissue. The maximal tumoral 11C-choline uptake is related to pT stage.
authors.affiliation: Department of Nuclear Medicine, University of Ulm, Ulm, Germany. sven.reske@uniklinik-ulm.de
authors.forename: Sven N
authors.initials: SN
authors.lastname: Reske
authors.forename: Norbert M
authors.initials: NM
authors.lastname: Blumstein
authors.forename: Bernd
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Neumaier
authors.forename: Hans-Werner
authors.initials: HW
authors.lastname: Gottfried
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Finsterbusch
authors.forename: Darius
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Kocot
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Möller
authors.forename: Gerhard
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Glatting
authors.forename: Sven
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Perner
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D001706:Biopsy; D002250:Carbon Radioisotopes; D002794:Choline / Q000494:pharmacology*; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D049268:Positron-Emission Tomography / Q000379:methods*; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000473:pathology; D012372:ROC Curve; D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D002250:Carbon Radioisotopes; D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D002794:Choline