Prognostic evaluation of PET/CT in residual post-chemotherapy masses in patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma and its impact on survival

Aim of the workTo evaluate the prognostic value and accuracy of PET/CT in DLBCL patients with post-treatment CT-residual masses with concern in overall (OAS) and progression-free survival (PFS).Materials and methodsWe retrospectively studied 62 patients with DLBCL who had CT documented residual masses (CRu) after completion of chemotherapy.ResultsForty-four patients with negative PET scan were free of relapse while 4 out of 18 patients with positive scan showed CR, the other 14 patients had developed relapse. PET attained a sensitivity of 100%, a specificity of 91%, a NPV of 100% and a PPV of 77.8% and an accuracy of 93.5%. The median OAS time was 33.59 months in patients with negative scan and 19.00 months in patients with positive scan with highly significant correlation (P value 0.0001) and the median PFS time was 29.53 months in patients with negative scan versus only 4.00 months in patients with positive scan with highly significant correlation (P value 0.0000).ConclusionPET/CT plays helpful part in evaluation of therapy response in DLBCL patients with CT residual mass and post-chemotherapy PET could be used as an accurate and good predictor of OAS and PFS.