FAPI-PET predicts concurrent chemoradiotherapy response in esophageal cancer patients: Study

The study led to the following findings:

• Non-responders had significantly higher TBRblood, TBRmuscle, and SUVmean than responders.
• TBRblood (area under the curve [AUC]=0.883), TBRmuscle (AUC=0.896), and SUVmean (AUC=0.870) were identified as significant predictors of the CCRT response, with respective cutoff values of 10.68, 10.95 and 6.88.
• For TBRblood, specificity, sensitivity, negative predictive value, positive predictive value, and accuracy respectively were 72.7%, 100.0%, 88.9%, 66.7%, and 77.8%; for TBRmuscle it was 72.7%, 100.0%, 88.9%, 66.7%, and 77.8%, and SUVmean 81.8%, 85.7%, 90.0%, 75.0%, and 83.3%, respectively.
• TBRblood, TBRmuscle, SUVmean, and tumor sites were significantly correlated with the short-term outcome, as shown by univariate logistic regression analysis.
• On multivariable logistic regression analysis, TBRblood was an independent prognostic factor for short-term outcomes.

"The findings suggest that pretreatment F-18 FAPI-04 PET/CT combined with clinical prognostic factors could be developed as an approach to help determine that chemotherapy would be beneficial in patients," the researchers wrote in their study.

"18F-FAPI-04 PET/CT may offer a standardized and reproducible technique for LA-ESCC patients identification who are most likely to respond to chemotherapy," they concluded.

Reference:

Hu X, Zhou T, Ren J, Duan J, Wu H, Liu X, Mu Z, Liu N, Wei Y, Yuan ST. Response prediction using 18F-FAPI-04 PET/CT in patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma treated with concurrent chemoradiotherapy. J Nucl Med. 2022 Oct 13:jnumed.122.264638. doi: 10.2967/jnumed.122.264638. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 36229183.