Fluorine-18-α-Methyltyrosine Positron Emission Tomography to Measure Therapy

L-[3-18F]-α-methyltyrosine (18F-FMT) is an amino-acid tracer for positron emission tomography (PET). The investigators evaluated the value of 18F-FMT PET for the assessment of therapy response in patients with lung cancer as compared with that of 2-[18F]-fluoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose (18F-FDG) PET.

The patients with lung cancer underwent PET studies with 18F-FDG and 18F-FMT before and after radio-/chemotherapy. The investigators used the ratio of the SUVmax of the mediastinal (N2) lymph node to the SUVmax of the primary tumor (N/P ratio ). All patients were divided into two groups of N/P ratio<1 and N/P ratio≥1, and the survival time was estimated by Kaplan-Meier method.