Sir Peter MacCallum Department of Oncology - Research Publications

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    PET/CT variants and pitfalls in malignant melanoma
    Aide, N ; Iravani, A ; Prigent, K ; Kottler, D ; Alipour, R ; Hicks, RJ (BMC, 2022-01-04)
    18F-FDG PET/CT plays an increasingly pivotal role in the staging and post-treatment monitoring of high-risk melanoma patients, augmented by the introduction of therapies, including tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKI) and immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs), that have novel modes of action that challenge conventional response assessment. Simultaneously, technological advances have been regularly released, including advanced reconstruction algorithms, digital PET and motion correction, which have allowed the PET community to detect ever-smaller cancer lesions, improving diagnostic performance in the context of indications previously viewed as limitations, such as detection of in-transit disease and confirmation of the nature of small pulmonary metastases apparent on CT.This review will provide advice regarding melanoma-related PET protocols and will focus on variants encountered during the imaging of melanoma patients. Emphasis will be made on pitfalls related to non-malignant diseases and treatment-related findings that may confound accurate interpretation unless recognized. The latter include signs of immune activation and immune-related adverse events (irAEs). Technology-related pitfalls are also discussed, since while new PET technologies improve detection of small lesions, these may also induce false-positive cases and require a learning curve to be observed. In these times of the COVID 19 pandemic, cases illustrating lessons learned from COVID 19 or vaccination-related pitfalls will also be described.
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    Nodal metabolic tumour volume on baseline 18F-FDG PET/CT and overall survival in stage II and III NSCLC patients undergoing curative-intent chemoradiotherapy/radiotherapy
    Alipour, R ; Bucknell, N ; Bressel, M ; Everitt, S ; MacManus, M ; Siva, S ; Hofman, MS ; Akhurst, T ; Hicks, RJ ; Iravani, A (WILEY, 2021-10)
    INTRODUCTION: This study aims to investigate whether nodal metabolic tumour volume (nMTV) and nodal total lesion glycolysis (nTLG) on Fluorine-18 fluoro-deoxy-glucose positron emission tomography-computed tomography (18 F-FDG PET/CT) in inoperable node-positive stage II and III non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) are independent predictors of overall survival (OS) in patients undergoing curative-intent chemoradiotherapy/radiotherapy (CRT/RT). METHODS: Data from two prospective trials between 2004 and 2016 were analysed retrospectively. Primary, nodal and total metabolic tumour volume and total lesion glycolysis (pMTV, nMTV, tMTV, pTLG, nTLG and tTLG, respectively) were derived from baseline 18 F-FDG PET/CT. Cox regressions were used to model OS by 18 F-FDG PET/CT parameters adjusting for overall stage. RESULTS: 89 patients with stage II (8%) and stage III (92%) were included. The median age at diagnosis was 67 years; 62% were male. The median follow-up was 6.9 years; the median OS was 2.2 years (95% CI 1.7-3.1). The median pMTV, nMTV and tMTV were 14 mL (range 0-360), 8 mL (range 0-250) and 34 mL (range 3-384), respectively. In 3 patients, the primary lesion could not be delineated from the central hilar mass. There was no association between nMTV (adjusted HR 1.04, 95% CI 0.95-1.15, P-value 0.43), pMTV (adjusted HR 1.0, 95% CI 0.96-1.04, P-value 0.92), tMTV (adjusted HR 1.0, 95% CI 0.97-1.04, P-value 0.88), nTLG, pTLG or tTLG and OS. Consistent results were noted when patients with central hilar lesions were excluded from analysis. CONCLUSION: In node-positive stage II and III NSCLC patients who underwent 18 F-FDG PET/CT-guided target delineation curative-intent concurrent CRT/RT, metabolic parameters did not appear to provide independent prognostication.