Nucl Med Mol Imaging.  2009 Feb;43(1):40-47.

Comparison of FDG Uptake with Pathological Parameters in the Well-differentiated Thyroid Cancer

Affiliations
  • 1Department of Radiology, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea, Seoul, Korea. nm@catholic.ac.kr
  • 2Department of Hospital pathology, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea, Seoul, Korea.
  • 3East-West Research Institute of Translational Medicine (EWTM), Incheon St. Mary's Hospital, Incheon, Korea.

Abstract

PURPOSE: Differentiated thyroid cancer (DTC) has variable degree of F-18 FDG avidity. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship between F-18 FDG uptake and pathological or immunohistochemical features of DTC.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
DTC patients who underwent both pre-operative F-18 FDG PET/CT scan and surgery were included in the study. Maximum standardized uptake values (SUVmax) of primary tumor were calculated. If the primary tumor showed no perceptibly increased F-18 FDG uptake, region of interest was drawn based on finding of CT portion of the PET/CT images. Pathological and immunohistochemical markers such as presence of lymph node (LN) metastasis and underlying thyroiditis, tumor size, Ki-67 labeling index, expressions of EGFR, COX-2, and Galectin-3 were evaluated.
RESULTS
Total of 106 patients was included (102 papillary carcinomas, 4 follicular carcinomas). The mean SUVmax of the large tumors (above 1 cm) was significantly higher than the mean SUVmax of small (equal to or less than 1 cm) ones (7.8+/-8.5 vs. 3.6+/-3.1, p=0.004). No significant difference in F-18 FDG uptake was found according to the presence or absence of LN metastasis and underlying thyroiditis, or the degree of Ki-67 labeling index, expression of EGFR, COX-2 and Galectin-3.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, the degree of F-18 FDG uptake in DTC was associated with the size of primary tumor. But there seem to be no relationship between F-18 FDG uptake of DTC and expression of Ki-67, EGFR, COX-2 and Galectin-3.

Keyword

Thyroid cancer; F-18 FDG; PET/CT

MeSH Terms

Carcinoma, Papillary
Galectin 3
Humans
Lymph Nodes
Neoplasm Metastasis
Thyroid Gland
Thyroid Neoplasms
Thyroiditis
Galectin 3
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