부산대학교 도서관

Purpose: To explore the potential complementary value of PET/CT and dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI in predicting pathological response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) of breast cancer and the dependency on breast cancer subtype. Methods: We performed F-FDG PET/CT and MRI examinations before and during NAC. The imaging features evaluated on both examinations included baseline and changes in F-FDG maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) on PET/CT, and tumour morphology and contrast uptake kinetics on MRI. The outcome measure was a (near) pathological complete response ((near-)pCR) after surgery. Receiver operating characteristic curves with area under the curve (AUC) were used to evaluate the relationships between patient, tumour and imaging characteristics and tumour responses. Results: Of 93 patients, 43 achieved a (near-)pCR. The responses varied among the different breast cancer subtypes. On univariate analysis the following variables were significantly associated with (near-)pCR: age ( p = 0.033), breast cancer subtype ( p < 0.001), relative change in SUVmax on PET/CT ( p < 0.001) and relative change in largest tumour diameter on MRI ( p < 0.001). The AUC for the relative reduction in SUVmax on PET/CT was 0.78 (95 % CI 0.68-0.88), and for the relative reduction in tumour diameter at late enhancement on MRI was 0.79 (95 % CI 0.70-0.89). The AUC increased to 0.90 (95 % CI 0.83-0.96) in the final multivariate model with PET/CT, MRI and breast cancer subtype combined ( p = 0.012). Conclusion: PET/CT and MRI showed comparable value for monitoring response during NAC. Combined use of PET/CT and MRI had complementary potential. Research with more patients is required to further elucidate the dependency on breast cancer subtype. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]