Application of Dynamic [18F]-FDG PET/CT Multiparametric Imaging Leads to an Improved Differentiation of Benign and Malignant Lung Lesions

Abstract Purpose To evaluate the potential of whole-body dynamic (WBD) 2-deoxy-2-[18F]fluoro-D-glucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography ([18F]-FDG PET/CT) multiparametric imaging in the differential diagnosis between benign and malignant lung lesions. Procedures We retrospectively analyzed WBD PET/CT scans from patients with lung lesions performed between April 2020 and March 2023. Multiparametric images including standardized uptake value (SUV), metabolic rate (MRFDG) and distribution volume (DVFDG) were visually interpreted and compared. We adopted SUVmax, metabolic tumor volume (MTV) and total lesion glycolysis (TLG) for semi-quantitative analysis, MRmax and DVmax values for quantitative analysis. We also collected the patients’ clinical characteristics. The variables above with P-value < 0.05 in the univariate analysis were entered into a multivariate logistic regression. The statistically significant metrics were plotted on receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curves. Results A total of 60 patients were included for data evaluation. We found that most malignant lesions showed high uptake on MRFDG and SUV images, and low or absent uptake on DVFDG images, while benign lesions showed low uptake on MRFDG images and high uptake on DVFDG images. Most malignant lesions showed a characteristic pattern of gradually increasing FDG uptake, whereas benign lesions presented an initial rise with rapid fall, then kept stable at a low level. The AUC values of MRmax and SUVmax are 0.874 (95% CI: 0.763–0.946) and 0.792 (95% CI: 0.667–0.886), respectively. DeLong’s test showed the difference between the areas is statistically significant (P < 0.001). Conclusions Our study demonstrated that dynamic [18F]-FDG PET/CT imaging based on the Patlak analysis was a more accurate method of distinguishing malignancies from benign lesions than conventional static PET/CT scans.