Clinically Significant Incidental Findings on the Unenhanced CT Portion of PET/CT Studies: the Indian Experience

Maria M D’souza, Rajnish Sharma, Abhinav Jaimini, Madhavi Tripathi, Anupam Mondal and RP Tripathi

Department of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences, Division of PET Imaging, Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences, India

^*Correspondance to: Maria M D�souza 

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Abstract:

Background: The unenhanced CT part of a PET/CT examination is undoubtedly useful for anatomical localization and attenuation correction. Our study was undertaken with the objective of evaluating the incidental findings from the unenhanced CT portion of PET/CT studies through independent interpretation by an expert CT radiologist and to assess their clinical significance.Methods: Standard PET/CT image acquisition protocol was used on a total of 300 patients. The unenhanced CT studies were read without prior knowledge of findings from PET and PET/CT fused images, independently by an experienced radiologist. All recorded findings were classified as being of major, moderate, or minor significance, corresponding to definitions previously used in similar studies.Results: Unenhanced CT revealed potentially clinically significant incidental findings in 11 patients, findings of moderate clinical importance in 15 patients and those of minor clinical importance in 214 patients. The first group largely included patients with neoplastic processes (both metastatic and synchronous primary) which were not detected solely on the PET images. There was a high proportion of tuberculosis (both active and healed) in the latter two groups.Conclusions: Incidental CT findings are commonly encountered in the course of a PET/CT examination. A small but significant proportion of cases have findings of major clinical significance, which may be detected only based on careful analysis of the CT component. Also, there is a high incidence of tuberculosis (both active and healed) in the Indian setting, which would have important clinical implications. Thus, skilled interpretation of the complete evaluation.

Keywords:

Incidental findings; Unenhanced CT; PET/CT

Cite the Article:

D’souza MM, Sharma R, Jaimini A, Tripathi M, Mondal A, Tripathi RP. Clinically Significant Incidental Findings on the Unenhanced CT Portion of PET/ CT Studies: the Indian Experience. Clin Oncol. 2017; 2: 1354.