Background
Lymphoid neoplasms that present with masses are broadly referred to as lymphomas, and they can be classified to two main groups: Hodgkin’s (HL) and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL); they are mainly characterized by enlargement of lymph nodes (nodal disease) although any organ in the body can be involved in different settings of the disease (extranodal disease). Adequate staging, which has a direct impact on prognosis, is essential to properly plan therapy. Stage IV disease with extranodal dissemination should be treated by long-term systemic chemotherapy.
By adding the metabolic changes to the conventional CT morphologic changes, combined positron emission tomography (PET) and computed tomography (CT) may offer clinically useful addition in staging of lymphomas and detection of extranodal lesions.
Results
The study included thirty nine patients, with forty-eight extranodal sites with lymphomatous infiltration, twenty-four males (61.5%), and fifteen females (38.4%). The patients showed forty-eight extranodal abdominal lymphomatous infiltration.
The study included twelve gastric lymphomatous lesions (25%), twelve splenic lymphomatous lesion (25%), three ileo-caecal lymphomatous lesions (6.25%), three patients (6.25%) with skin infiltration, three adrenal lymphomatous lesions (6.25%), three patients with hepatic lymphoma, and twelve bone marrow infiltrations (25%).
The most accurate SUV max cutoff value among studied cases was 3.5, the highest SUV max value noted was 21 in gastric lesions, and the lowest SUV max noted was 4.1 in adrenal lesions.
Confirmation of PET/CT results was done by histopathological assessment and post-management follow-up.
Conclusion
PET/CT study is an effective tool for evaluation of extranodal lymphomas. PET/CT fusion images can affect the clinical management plan by detection of extranodal lymphomas with lymphoma staging modification.
