TY - JOUR T1 - PET and PET/CT of the Neck Lymph Nodes Improves Risk Prediction in Patients with Squamous Cell Carcinoma of the Oral Cavity JF - Journal of Nuclear Medicine JO - J Nucl Med SP - 180 LP - 187 DO - 10.2967/jnumed.110.082370 VL - 52 IS - 2 AU - Chun-Ta Liao AU - Hung-Ming Wang AU - Shiang-Fu Huang AU - I-How Chen AU - Chung-Jan Kang AU - Chien-Yu Lin AU - Kang-Hsing Fan AU - Shu-Hang Ng AU - Chuen Hsueh AU - Li-Yu Lee AU - Chih-Hung Lin AU - Tzu-Chen Yen Y1 - 2011/02/01 UR - http://jnm.snmjournals.org/content/52/2/180.abstract N2 - We prospectively evaluated the sensitivity and specificity of 18F-FDG PET in the detection of neck lymph node metastases in patients with oral cavity squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). We also sought to evaluate whether pretreatment PET visual scores in the neck lymph nodes may improve risk stratification. Methods: We enrolled 473 OSCC patients (445 men and 28 women; mean age ± SD, 50.9 ± 11.7 y) without distant metastases. All participants underwent 18F-FDG PET within 2 wk before surgery and neck dissection. Histopathology was taken as the reference standard for neck lymph node status. The duration of follow-up was at least 24 mo in all surviving patients. Results: 18F-FDG PET correctly diagnosed 164 of 211 patients with neck metastases and 152 of 262 subjects without pathologic neck metastases, resulting in a patient-based sensitivity and specificity of 77.7% and 58.0%, respectively. In Cox models adjusting for age, sex, traditional risk factors, and treatment modality, PET results at the neck lymph nodes were significantly and independently associated with rates of neck control, distant metastasis, disease-free survival, disease-specific survival, and overall survival. Notably, the results of the c-statistics demonstrated that PET score improved the accuracy of risk prediction in terms of overall and disease-free survival rates. Conclusion: PET findings at the neck lymph nodes have limited sensitivity and specificity for primary staging of OSCC but improve risk stratification beyond that of traditional risk factors. ER -