Impact of F-18 FDG PET/CT imaging of Carney’s triad

Learning Objectives 1. To present the F-18 FDG PET/CT features of the Carney’s triad, which includes gastrointestinal stromal tumor and related nodal metastasis, extra-adrenal paraganglioma, esophageal leiomyomas and adrenal gland adenoma, and 2. To emphasize the superiority and impact of PET/CT over other conventional cross-sectional imaging in the staging and post-therapeutic surveillance of this syndrome.

Carney’s triad is a clinical syndrome characterized by the association of either synchronous or metachronous pulmonary chondroma, gastrointestinal stromal tumor and extra-adrenal paraganglioma. This entity may be encountered with esophageal leiomyoma and adrenal gland adenoma. It is exceptionally rare to demonstrate on one single imaging modality all or nearly all lesion components of this syndrome. The authors present a near complete Carney’s triad, minus pulmonary chondroma, detected by F-18 FDG PET/CT. Each PET/CT depicted lesion of this case, namely the gastrointestinal stromal tumor of the stomach and duodenum with gastrohepatic nodal metastasis, pelvic paraganglioma, esophageal leiomyomas, bilateral adrenal gland adenomas and concomitant left breast cancer with left axillary nodal metastasis, is illustrated and discussed with corresponding conventional cross-sectional imaging and histopathology.