Integrated contrast-enhanced diagnostic whole-body PET/CT as a first-line restaging modality in patients with suspected metastatic recurrence of breast cancer.
OBJECTIVE
Only few information exist about the diagnostic accuracy of PET/CT for restaging patients with metastatic recurrence of breast carcinoma. Therefore, our study hypothesis was to perform diagnostic contrast enhanced CT (ce-CT) and FDG-PET in a one-step investigation, to prove sensitivity of each modality and to determine whether diagnostic PET/CT adds information over PET or contrast enhanced CT alone for restaging of patients with suspected recurrence of breast cancer.


METHODS
Fifty-two patients with suspected recurrence of breast cancer were included in our study. All of them were free of metastasis after the first line therapy. Indications for restaging were: Elevated tumor markers n=32, clinical deterioration n=16 and/or suspicious findings on other imaging studies n=48. Integrated PET/CT was performed using contrast-enhanced diagnostic CT for attenuation correction.


RESULTS
PET was correct in 44/52 patients (85%), ce-CT in 38/52 patients (73%) and PET/CT in 50/52 patients (96%). Sensitivity and specificity of lesion detection of PET, CT and PET/CT were 84%, 66% and 93%, and 100%, 92%, and 100%, respectively.


CONCLUSIONS
PET/CT can improve staging and alter therapeutic options in patients suspected to have breast cancer recurrence and distant metastatic disease, primarily by demonstrating local or distant nodal involvement occult at other imaging studies. The added value of FDG-PET/CT over other diagnostic modalities is mainly expressed by the fact that a noninvasive whole-body evaluation is possible in a single examination.
Dirisamer
Albert
A
Department of Nuclear Medicine, St. Vincent's Hospital, Seilerstaette 4, 4010 Linz, Austria. albert.dirisamer@meduniwien.ac.at
Halpern
Benjamin S
BS
Flöry
Daniel
D
Wolf
Florian
F
Beheshti
Mohsen
M
Mayerhoefer
Marius E
ME
Langsteger
Werner
W
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000556:secondary*; D003287:Contrast Media; D005260:Female; D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D009364:Neoplasm Recurrence, Local / Q000175:diagnosis*; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D049268:Positron-Emission Tomography / Q000379:methods*; D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D013382:Subtraction Technique; D018511:Systems Integration; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000379:methods*; D014283:Triiodobenzoic Acids; D051598:Whole Body Imaging / Q000379:methods*
D003287:Contrast Media; D019275:Radiopharmaceuticals; D014283:Triiodobenzoic Acids; D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18; C053571:iopentol