Interview with Dr. Laura Mertens at EMUC 2014
Under staging has been up to 30% in bladder cancer patients. Both distant metastases and nodal metastases can be detected by preoperative FDG-PET in 20% of patients with muscle invasive disease. Unfortunately, FDG-PET is less useful for local staging. False-positive FDG-PET scans can occur and therefore biopsies of lesions should be performed in cases where the results change treatment plans. Possibly FDG-PET can be used to evaluate response to chemotherapy but the timing of imaging is still unclear.
