Current clinical use of 18FDG-PET/CT in patients with thoracic and systemic sarcoidosis

Purpose

This study assessed the role of whole-body ¹⁸fluorodeoxyglucose positron-emission tomography/computed tomography (¹⁸FDG PET/CT) in the restaging and follow-up of patients with sarcoidosis previously studied by multidetector computed tomography (MDCT).

Materials and methods

This retrospective study enroled 21 patients to evaluate the sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of ¹⁸FDG-PET/CT and MDCT. The results of the two techniques were compared with the Mc Nemar test. Cohen’s K was used to compare concordance at the different lesion sites.

Results

The sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of ¹⁸FDG-PET/CT were 80, 66.67, and 76.19 %, respectively. The sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of MDCT were 93.33, 33.33, and 76.19 %, respectively. In 16 patients who underwent whole-body MDCT, the sensitivity, specificity and accuracy values were 91.67, 81.25, and 50 % (MDCT) and 100, 50, and 87.5 % (¹⁸FDG-PET/CT).

Conclusions

¹⁸FDG-PET/CT is useful in evaluating the extent of sarcoidosis and recognising lesions at different sites, including lymph nodes, lungs, liver, spleen and bone. It also improves the interpretation of the morphological lesions seen on MDCT and depicts a larger number of lesions. Therefore, ¹⁸FDG-PET/CT could be used to complement other more traditional techniques for the restaging and follow-up in patients with sarcoidosis.