Abstract
1402
Objectives There is limited evidence describing cerebral FDG distribution occurring throughout normal childhood (existing reports typically involve children with a neurological event and/or receiving anti-epileptic medication) and a database of normal pediatric cerebral FDG PET/CT scans is not available for use in comparative voxel-based morphometric analyses such as statistical parametric mapping (SPM). We aimed to recruit a dataset of “normal” cerebral FDG PET/CT scans to describe the patterns of brain glucose metabolism throughout childhood and also for use in SPM analysis.
Methods Patients referred for a whole body FDG PET/CT scan investigating suspected or proven extra-cranial solid tumors prior to chemotherapy, with normal development, no neurological co-morbidities, no CNS metastases and not taking anti-epileptic medication who underwent dedicated cerebral FDG PET/CT imaging as part of their whole body staging procedure were included. These scans were considered to represent a dataset of normal cerebral FDG PET/CT scans.
Results 43 scans were eligible (mean age 9.3yrs, range 11mths-16yrs). These included: 8 Hodgkin’s Disease, 7 Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, 4 soft tissue sarcoma, 4 Ewing’s sarcoma, 2 osteosarcoma, 2 primitive neuroectodermal tumors, 2 germ cell tumor, 2 Langerhan cell histiocytosis, 1 each of Wilm’s tumor, renal cell carcinoma, nasopharyngeal carcinoma, neuroblastoma, malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor and melanoma. 6 patients with eventual diagnosis of benign conditions were included (mesenteric adenitis, reactive adenopathy, hemagioma, non-specific weight loss).
Conclusions 43 scans have been recruited to serve as a comparative group for SPM analysis of pediatric FDG PET/CT scans. The database serves as a reference for qualitative visual assessment, particularly useful in the younger age range. When more patients are included, descriptive statistical SPM analysis by age group will be useful to characterise changes in regional brain glucose utilisation that occur during normal development