Evaluation of Prostate Cancer Bone Metastases with 18F-NaF and 18F-Fluorocholine PET/CT

Abstract

¹⁸F-fluorocholine is a specific promising agent for imaging tumor cell proliferation, particularly in prostate cancer, using PET/CT. It is a beneficial tool in the early detection of marrow-based metastases because it excludes distant metastases and evaluates the response to hormone therapy. In addition, ¹⁸F-fluorocholine has the potential to differentiate between degenerative and malignant osseous abnormalities because degenerative changes are not choline-avid; however, the agent may accumulate in recent traumatic bony lesions. On the other hand, ¹⁸F-NaF PET/CT can indicate increased bone turnover and is generally used in the assessment of primary and secondary osseous malignancies, the evaluation of response to treatment, and the clarification of abnormalities on other imaging modalities or clinical data. ¹⁸F-NaF PET/CT is a highly sensitive method in the evaluation of bone metastases from prostate cancer, but it has problematic specificity, mainly because of tracer accumulation in degenerative and inflammatory bone diseases. In summary, ¹⁸F-NaF PET/CT is a highly sensitive method, but ¹⁸F-fluorocholine PET/CT can detect early bone marrow metastases and provide greater specificity in the detection of bone metastases in patients with prostate cancer. However, the difference seems not to be significant.

Keywords: 18F-NaF PET/CT; 18F-choline PET/CT; bone metastasis; prostate cancer.