Normal tissue 18F-FDG uptake in patients with non-small cell lung cancer.

Cytotoxic effects in organs at risk are dose limiting factors for both radio-therapy (RT) and targeted-therapy. Medical imaging such as ¹⁸FDG-PET/CT may be employed to study the response patterns in normal tissues and to identify cytotoxic effects of treatment. Patients with advanced stage non-small cell lung cancer, participating in a phase II trial on combined radiation and erlotinib therapy, were included in this study. The effect of erlotinib in addition to RT on ¹⁸FDG uptake in normal lung tissue was investigated at different time points. Furthermore, a new method is developed when looking for higher sensitivity in term of visualizing new areas of interest and a clearer ¹⁸FDG uptake dose response in the lung. In addition, we studied how various values derived from PET images (such as SUV₇₅ in the lung) correlate with e.g.serum cytokines.