Rare metastases detected by (68)Ga-somatostatin receptor PET/CT in patients with neuroendocrine tumors.
OBJECTIVE
The most common sites of metastasis in neuroendocrine tumors are liver, lymph nodes, and bone. The aim of this study is to determine the prevalence and location of other sites of metastasis.


METHODS
4,210 Ga-68 somatostatin-receptor PET/CT studies were performed at our center between July 2004 and December 2009. We retrospectively reviewed the reports of patients to check rare sites of metastasis other than liver, bone, and lymph nodes. Lesions were confirmed on follow-up and/or other imaging methods (MRI, echocardiography, and ultrasound).


RESULTS
The different sites of metastasis according to frequency of occurrence were: cardiac (n = 29), breast (n = 21), retro-orbital (n = 9), uterus (n = 7), skin (n = 8), brain (n = 6), spleen (n = 3), testes (n = 1), seminal vesicle (n = 1), and intramuscular in psoas muscle (n = 4).


CONCLUSIONS
Cardiac and breast metastases appear to be not infrequent in neuroendocrine tumor patients. Ga-68 somatostatin-receptor PET/CT enables detection of these and other rare sites of metastasis.
Department of Nuclear Medicine, ENETS Center of Excellence, Zentralklinik Bad Berka, Bad Berka, Germany.
Cecilia
C
Carreras
Harshad R
HR
Kulkarni
Richard P
RP
Baum
D000368:Aged; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000556:secondary; D005260:Female; D005710:Gallium Radioisotopes; D006338:Heart Neoplasms / Q000556:secondary; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D064847:Multimodal Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D018358:Neuroendocrine Tumors / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000556:secondary*; D049268:Positron-Emission Tomography; D017481:Receptors, Somatostatin / Q000032:analysis*; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed
D005710:Gallium Radioisotopes; D017481:Receptors, Somatostatin