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Skeletal muscle uptake of fluorine-18-FDG: effect of oral diazepam
1Clinical PET Center, University Medical School, Guys Hospital, London, United Kingdom.
Unlabelled:
We have observed a pattern of symmetrically increased uptake of [18F]fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) in the neck and thoracic paravertebral regions of several patients referred for whole-body PET. The distribution is suggestive of uptake in contracting skeletal muscle in tense patients.
Methods:
To test this hypothesis, six successive patients who exhibited this pattern of uptake underwent rescanning using an identical imaging protocol but with oral diazepam before injection of FDG.
Results:
The increased neck and paravertebral uptake was significantly reduced or abolished with diazepam, confirming the supposition that this increased neck and paravertebral uptake represents a normal variant of muscle uptake.
Conclusion:
Oral diazepam, given before the uptake period can be helpful in such patients to exclude the masking of potential abnormalities by this characteristic pattern of FDG uptake.