Metabolic activity measured on PET/CT correlates with clinical outcomes in patients with limb and girdle sarcomas

To explore the relationship between metabolic activity and outcome in patients with extremity sarcomas.

Between June 2004 and December 2011, 120 patients with newly diagnosed limb and girdle sarcomas underwent FDG-PET/CT for disease staging prior to curative intent treatment. The maximum standardized uptake value (SUV(max)) was measured for each primary tumor and correlated with outcome. Progression-free survival and overall survival (OS) were analyzed using the Kaplan-Meier method.

Soft-tissue sarcomas were more frequent (68%) than bone (27%) or cartilage (5%) tumors. Median follow-up was 33.2 months. 51% of patients progressed during the follow-up interval and 38% died. SUV(max) was dichotomized with a cut-point of 10.3. Patients with SUV(max) < 10.3 had better DFS and OS compared with patients with SUV(max) ≥ 10.3 (P < 0.001 and P < 0.001, respectively [log-rank test]). Multivariate analysis confirmed that even after adjusting for age, sex, site, tumor type (bone vs. soft-tissue), grade, and stage; an SUV(max) ≥ 10.3 correlated with a twofold risk of progression and 2.4 times greater risk of death (hazard ratio [HR] 2.0, 95% CI, 1.1-3.7, and HR, 2.4, 95% CI, 1.1-4.9).

SUV(max) is an independent adverse prognostic factor for both progression and OS in patients with extremity sarcomas.