THE UTILITY OF 18F-FDG PET/CT IN DETECTING RECURRENT BREAST CANCER AND ITS CORRELATION WITH SOME CLINICAL CHARACTERISTICS
.
Abstract
Objective: To evaluate the role of 18F-FDG PET/CT in detecting recurrent breast cancer lesions and its association with various clinical characteristics.
Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted on 32 patients at Vietnam National Cancer Hospital who were diagnosed with recurrent breast cancer based on histopathological confirmation and subsequently underwent 18F-FDG PET/CT for evaluation.
Results: The mean age of the 32 female patients was 53.7 years (range: 39-74 years). The most common histopathological subtype was infiltrating duct carcinoma, not otherwise specified (59.4%). Recurrence was most commonly detected in stage II (43.8%) and stage III (34.4%), with 56.3% of cases presenting with lymph node metastases prior to treatment. The most common sites of recurrence were the lymph nodes (53.1%) and chest wall (18.8%). The median time to recurrence detection was 25 months. 18F-FDG PET/CT accurately identified recurrent disease in 28 cases (sensitivity: 87.5%), with a mean SUVmax of 10.2. Additionally, metastatic lesions in other locations were detected in 15 out of 28 cases. Higher SUVmax values were observed in patients with advanced-stage disease, lymph node metastases, ER-negative status, PR-negative status, and HER2-positive tumors. No significant difference in SUVmax was observed among different histopathological subtypes.
Conclusion: 18F-FDG PET/CT demonstrates high sensitivity in detecting recurrent breast cancer lesions and reveals variations in SUVmax values associated with clinical and paraclinical characteristics. However, given the limited sample size, further studies with larger cohorts are required to validate these findings.
.
Keywords
Recurrent breast cancer; 18F-FDG PET/CT; clinical - paraclinical characteristics.
- Bray, F., et al., Global cancer statistics 2022: GLOBOCAN estimates of incidence and mortality worldwide for 36 cancers in 185 countries. CA Cancer J Clin, 2024. 74(3): p. 229-263.
- Courtney, D., et al., Breast cancer recurrence: factors impacting occurrence and survival. Ir J Med Sci, 2022. 191(6): p. 2501-2510.
- Zhang-Yin, J., State of the Art in 2022 PET/CT in Breast Cancer: A Review. J Clin Med, 2023. 12(3).
- Xiao, Y., et al., Diagnostic efficacy of 18F-FDG-PET or PET/CT in breast cancer with suspected recurrence: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Nucl Med Commun, 2016. 37(11): p. 1180-8.
- Taalab, K., et al., The diagnostic value of PET/CT in breast cancer recurrence and metastases. Egyptian J. Nucl. Mel, 2017. 15.
- Dong, Y., et al., The diagnostic value of 18F-FDG PET/CT in association with serum tumor marker assays in breast cancer recurrence and metastasis. Biomed Res Int, 2015. 2015: p. 489021.
- Boellaard, R., et al., Effects of noise, image resolution, and ROI definition on the accuracy of standard uptake values: a simulation study. J Nucl Med, 2004. 45(9): p. 1519-27.
- Sinn, H.P. and H. Kreipe, A Brief Overview of the WHO Classification of Breast Tumors, 4th Edition, Focusing on Issues and Updates from the 3rd Edition. Breast Care (Basel), 2013. 8(2): p. 149-54.
- Giuliano, A.E., S.B. Edge, and G.N. Hortobagyi, Eighth Edition of the AJCC Cancer Staging Manual: Breast Cancer. Ann Surg Oncol, 2018. 25(7): p. 1783-1785.
- Bitencourt, A.G., et al., Correlation between PET/CT results and histological and immunohistochemical findings in breast carcinomas. Radiol Bras, 2014. 47(2): p. 67-73.
- de Mooij, C.M., et al., The influence of receptor expression and clinical subtypes on baseline [18F]FDG uptake in breast cancer: systematic review and meta-analysis. EJNMMI Res, 2023. 13(1): p. 5.
