Influence of bowel preparation before 18F-FDG PET/CT on physiologic 18F-FDG activity in the intestine.
Our objective was to investigate the use of bowel preparation before (18)F-FDG PET/CT to reduce intestinal (18)F-FDG uptake.


METHODS
Sixty-five patients with abdominal neoplasias were assigned either to a bowel-preparation group (n = 26) or to a native group (n = 39). (18)F-FDG activity was measured in the small intestine and the colon.


RESULTS
In the 26 patients with bowel preparation, average maximal standardized uptake value (SUVmax) was 3.5 in the small intestine and 4.4 in the colon. In the 39 patients without bowel preparation, average SUVmax was 2.6 in the small intestine and 2.7 in the colon. (18)F-FDG activity impaired diagnosis in 6 patients (23%) in the bowel-preparation group and 11 patients (28%) in the native group (P = 0.5). SUVmax in the colon was significantly higher in the bowel-preparation group (P = 0.002), but SUVmax in the small intestine did not significantly differ between the 2 groups (P = 0.088).


CONCLUSIONS
Bowel preparation increases (18)F-FDG activity in the large intestine and is therefore not useful before PET/CT.
Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Hospital, Zurich, Switzerland. jan.soyka@usz.ch
Jan D
JD
Soyka
Klaus
K
Strobel
Patrick
P
Veit-Haibach
Niklaus G
NG
Schaefer
Daniel T
DT
Schmid
Alois
A
Tschopp
Thomas F
TF
Hany
D000368:Aged; D016477:Artifacts; D001692:Biological Transport; D003106:Colon / Q000378:metabolism; D005260:Female; D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18 / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000493:pharmacokinetics; D006801:Humans; D007413:Intestinal Mucosa / Q000378:metabolism*; D007421:Intestine, Small / Q000378:metabolism; D007422:Intestines / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D008297:Male; D049268:Positron-Emission Tomography / Q000379:methods*; D016037:Single-Blind Method; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000379:methods*
D019788:Fluorodeoxyglucose F18