FDG positron emission tomography/computed tomography for the detection of extrahepatic metastases from hepatocellular carcinoma.
OBJECTIVE
To compare the efficacy of positron emission tomography (PET) computed tomography (CT), multi-detector helical computed tomography (MDCT) and bone scintigraphy for the detection of extrahepatic metastases in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).


METHODS
Thirty-four patients diagnosed with metastatic HCC were enrolled in this study. The lesions included lung (n = 18), bone (n = 12) and lymph node (n = 16) metastases. For receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis, lesions were diagnosed as metastatic HCC by two experienced abdominal radiologists. Another three physicians independently reviewed both positive and negative images. Each physician read three sets of images of MDCT, PET-CT and bone scintigraphy for bone metastasis.


RESULTS
The mean sensitivity and specificity for diagnosis of lung metastasis were 85.2 and 88.9% for MDCT, and 59.2 and 92.6% for PET-CT, respectively. For lymph node metastasis, these values were 62.5 and 79.2% for MDCT, and 66.7 and 91.7% for PET-CT, respectively; and for bone metastasis 41.6 and 94.5% for MDCT, 83.3 and 86.1% for PET-CT, and 52.7 and 83.3% for bone scintigraphy, respectively. The mean Az values were 0.95 and 0.77 for MDCT and PET-CT in lung metastasis, respectively, 0.75 and 0.80 for MDCT and PET-CT for lymph node metastasis, respectively, and 0.59, 0.88 and 0.62 for MDCT, PET-CT and bone scintigraphy for bone metastasis, respectively.


CONCLUSIONS
PET-CT has high sensitivity and is more suitable for the detection of bone metastases from primary HCC, relative to MDCT and bone scintigraphy.
Kawaoka
Tomokazu
T
Department of Medicine and Molecular Science, Division of Frontier Medical Science, Programs for Biomedical Research, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan.
Aikata
Hiroshi
H
Takaki
Shintaro
S
Uka
Kiminori
K
Azakami
Takahiro
T
Saneto
Hiromi
H
Jeong
Soo Cheol
SC
Kawakami
Yoshiiku
Y
Takahashi
Shoichi
S
Toyota
Naoyuki
N
Ito
Katsuhide
K
Hirokawa
Yutaka
Y
Chayama
Kazuaki
K