The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of Beijing Cancer Hospital (no. 2019KT95) and registered in ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT04367948).

Though the pathogenesis of myasthenia gravis (MG) is not fully understood, the role of inflammation has been well appreciated in the development of MG. We aimed to investigate the role of neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) in MG patients and the relationship between the NLR and the activity of the disease. A total number of 172 MG patients and 207 healthy controls (HC) were enrolled in this study. The MG patients were divided into tertiles according to NLR (low NLR < 1.58, n = 57; intermediate NLR 1.58–2.33, n = 57 and high NLR > 2.33, n = 58). The disease activity assessment was performed according to the standard criteria established by the Myasthenia Gravis Foundation of America. Patients with MG had significantly higher NLR when compared with the HC group (P < 0.0001). The NLR levels were higher in the MG patients with severe disease activity than those with mild disease activity (P < 0.001), meanwhile, median NLR was statistically higher in MG patients with myasthenic crisis (MC) than those without MC (P < 0.001). Incidences of severe disease activity and MC were both higher in the high NLR group, compared to low and intermediate NLR groups (both P < 0.001). Multivariate logistic regression analysis suggested that elevated NLR was an independent predictor of severe disease activity (odds ratio = 13.201, CI% = 1.418–122.938, P = 0.023). These results indicate that NLR may be a simple and useful potential marker in indicating disease activity in patients with MG.

PurposeThis study aimed to compare the diagnostic performance of [68Ga]Ga-FAPI-04 PET/CT and [18F]F-FDG PET/CT in primary and metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC) lesions.MethodsThis single-center preliminary clinical study (NCT04750772) was conducted at the Peking University Cancer Hospital &amp; Institute and included 61 participants with CRC who underwent sequential evaluation through PET/CT with [18F]F-FDG and [68Ga]Ga-FAPI-04. Their PET/CT images were analysed to quantify the uptake of the two tracers in the form of maximum standardised uptake (SUVmax) values and target-to-background ratio (TBR), which were then compared using Wilcoxon’s signed-rank test. The final changes in the tumour–node–metastasis (TNM) stage of all participants were recorded.ResultsOf all the participants, 21 were treatment naïve and 40 had been previously treated. In primary CRC lesions, the average TBRs of [68Ga]Ga-FAPI-04 and [18F]F-FDG were 13.3 ± 8.9 and 8.2 ± 6.5, respectively. The SUVmax of [68Ga]Ga-FAPI-04 in signet-ring/mucinous carcinomas (11.4 ± 4.9) was higher than that of [18F]F-FDG (7.9 ± 3.6) (P = 0.03). Both median SUVmax in peritoneal metastases and TBR in liver metastases of [68Ga]Ga-FAPI-04 were higher than those of [18F]F-FDG (5.2 vs. 3.8, P &lt; 0.001; 3.7 vs. 1.9, P &lt; 0.001, respectively). Compared with [18F]F-FDG PET/CT, clinical TNM staging based on [68Ga]Ga-FAPI-04 PET/CT led to upstaging and downstaging in 10 (16.4%) and 5 participants (8.2%), respectively. Therefore, the treatment options were changed in 13 participants (21.3%), including 9 with additional chemo/radiotherapy and/or surgery and others with avoidance or narrowed scope of surgery.Conclusion[68Ga]Ga-FAPI-04 showed potential as a novel PET/CT tracer to detect lymph nodes and distant metastases, which improved CRC staging, thus prompting the optimisation or adjustment of treatment decisions.

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