Evaluation of the Value of ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT in Identifying Recurrent Breast Cancer Lesions

Abstract

Objective: To assess the role of ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT in detecting recurrent lesions in breast cancer patients following curative-intent treatment at K Hospital.
Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted on 115 female breast cancer patients who were clinically or paraclinically suspected of recurrence at least six months after completion of curativeintent therapy at K Hospital between November 2021 and December 2023. All participants underwent ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT for assessment evaluation.
Results: The mean age was 53.7 ± 10.1 years. Invasive ductal carcinoma of no special type comprised 83.5% of cases, and the ERpositive/HER-2-negative phenotype was present in 43.7%. ¹⁸F-FDG PET/
CT yielded a sensitivity of 91.8%, specificity of 93.3%, positive predictive value of 90.9%, negative predictive value of 92.2%, and overall accuracy of 92.2% for recurrence detection. The mean SUVₘₐₓ of recurrent lesions was 10.4 ± 4.7. ROC analysis revealed an AUC of 0.92. Among 56 patients with histopathologically confirmed recurrence, PET/CT detected an additional 28 unsuspected lesions (50%), achieving the highest PPV among all modalities evaluated.
Conclusion: ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT demonstrates high accuracy in diagnosing recurrent breast cancer compared with other modalities, with SUVₘₐₓ values at readily detectable levels and the capacity to identify
additional lesions.