Abstract
Neoadjuvant or preoperative chemotherapy (NAC) is consid-ered the standard of care in the treatment of locally advancedbreast cancer [1]. Its potential benefits include: (1) reductionin size of the primary tumour allowing conversion of mastec-tomy candidates to breast-conserving surgery candidates; (2)reduction in lymph node involvement allowing to conversionof patients requiring axillary dissection to candidates for sen-tinel node biopsy; (3) testing of tumour chemosensitivity toallow changes in therapy regimen, if needed; (4) correlationbetween achievement of a pathological complete response(pCR) on NAC completion and long-term prognosis; and (5)assessment of molecular changes during NAC as a means toassess response to specific chemotherapy and to discover offuturepossibledrugtargets[2].Therefore,monitoringtumourresponse to NAC is useful from a clinical, diagnostic andprognostic point of view. It is usually evaluated by clinicaland conventional imaging modalities, such as mammographyand/or ultrasonography, although these are unreliable andinaccurate tools. There is evidence that contrast-enhancedMRI could be superior to standard clinical assessmentmethods in determining the prognostic response to NAC [3,4]. Conversely, in recent years the role of PET/CT with
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