The Effect on Survival and Mortality of the Highest SUVmax Value on Metastatic Foci in Postoperative Kidney Tumors.

Objective: One-third of patients newly diagnosed with a kidney tumor have metachoronous disease, 25-50% have synchronous metastasis, and approximately 30-40% of patients have metastasis at the time of diagnosis. Metastasis mostly occurs in the lungs, regional lymph nodes, bones, and liver. The present study was aimed to determine the effect on mortality the values of standard uptake value (SUV)max measured with positron emission tomography (PET) in metastases of kidney tumors.

Material and Methods: A retrospective review was conducted of the files of 77 patients newly diagnosed with kidney tumor and disease staging determined with PET in the Nuclear medicine Department of Saglik Bilimleri University Diyarbakir Gazi Yasargil Training and Research Hospital between August 2007 and April 2012. The gender, age, histological types, metastases, SUVmax values, and dates of death of the patients were recorded in the SPSS software.

Results: It was observed that higher SUVmax values indicated a shorter survival time (r = .303) (P = 0.022). Patients with metastasis lived for a shorter period (P < 0.001), particularly those with liver metastasis (r = .515) (P = 0.049). Metastases were most frequently seen in lymph nodes (42.1%); the SUVmax values of lung metastases were higher (P = 0.025) and papillary carcinomas showed higher SUVmax uptake (P = 0.015).

Conclusions: In the present study, it was concluded that the higher the SUVmax value the shorter the survival time. The survival time of patients with metastasis was shorter, and this could be estimated through the measured SUVmax values.