863 Clinical applications of FDG positron emission tomography in patients with soft tissue sarcoma

Abstract

Various applications of positron emission tomography (PET) were studied in patients with soft tissue sarcoma: depiction of primary and recurrent lesions, determination of malignancy grade and evaluation of response to regional isolation perfusion. Twenty-nine patients with various types of soft tissue sarcoma were studied, 17 with a primary tumor and 12 patients with a local recurrence. The tumor size ranged from 1.0 to 31 cm. An IV dose of 370 MBq 18F-fluoro-deoxy-D-glucose (FDG) was administered. PET studies were performed in a dynamic and a “whole body” mode using a Siemens ECAT 951 camera. All 17 primary tumors and 11 of the 12 recurrent sarcomas were well visualized on the PET studies. The location of the recurrent lesions was clearly depicted in the presence of surrounding scar tissue and fibrosis. The glucose metabolic rate in the lesions was found to increase with increasing malignancy grade (P The decrease in glucose metabolic rate after TNF perfusion (20 patients) was found to provide information about the tumor response. In summary, several clinical applications of PET with FDG were established in patients with soft tissue sarcoma.