Accuracy of positron emission tomography and computed tomography (PET/CT) in detecting nodal metastasis according to histology of non-small cell lung cancer

AbstractPositron emission tomography and computed tomography (PET –CT) is the non-invasive gold standard method for determining the oncological stage of patient with diagnosis of lung cancer. A correct preoperative staging is significant because only patients who do not have a history of regional or distant disease are those who will benefit from a surgical trea tment. However, due to the different values of the PET–CT in terms of sensitivity and specificity to evaluate the mediastinal lymph node involvement, it is often necessary to perform a surgical mediastinal sampling through a cervical video mediastinoscopy (VM). Patient’s risk factors which could modify the results of the PET scan, performing differences between non-invasive staging and the lymph node sampling due to VM are not yet clearly established in the literature. This knowledge will allow to identify in whom a surgical staging by sampling the mediastinal lymph nodes is needed. We inc luded 234 patients with diagnosis of lung cancer who underwent a mediastinal lymph node staging by PET–CT images and histopathological results of mediastinal sampling by VM, analyzing the sensitivity and specificity of this non-invasive imaging study. We also analyzed variables that could modify t he results of PET–CT, such as tumor type, location of the tumor and patient’s history. We showed that those PET–CT presented an overall sensitivity and specificity of 93.8 and 62.7%, respectively, with negative and positive p...
Source: Updates in Surgery - Category: Surgery Source Type: research