Positron Emission Tomography/Computed Tomography (18F-FDGMPET/CT) in patients with colorectal carcinoma - literature review

Colorectal carcinoma (CRC) is the third most common cancer worldwide. There is tendency for increasing the incidence and morbidity caused by CRC. Early diagnosis and adequate treatment strategy significantly increase patients life expectancy. The literature review shows that PET/CT plays limited role in staging of patients with CRC, and is used mainly for further specification of findings, suggesting distant metastases. Due to its high sensitivity and specificity for CRC, PET/CT is used for re-staging in cases of elevated tumor markers, equivocal results from other imaging studies (local recurrence, specification of lymph nodes or liver lesions), as well as for evaluating the effect from chemotherapy. PET/CT may be useful for adjustment of the treatment methods, planning surgical interventions and radiotherapy as well as for evaluating their effect. In future, it is expected more data to be generated concerning the application of PET/CT for early assessment of different therapeutic methods and about its prognostic value.