A report from the Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care in Cologne, Germany, has determined that "no robust conclusions are possible" on the advantages or disadvantages of using PET to detect recurrences of malignant gliomas.
Depending on the disease stage, the fast-growing brain tumors offer poor prospects of recovery in patients.
The institute investigated two research questions:
- Does PET or a combination of PET and CT contribute to patients with recurrence of glioma surviving longer or experiencing fewer complications caused by their disease or treatment?
- Can recurrence of glioma after treatment be detected more accurately with PET or PET/CT than with other methods?
Researchers reviewed 12 studies on PET and concluded that the results differed so substantially between studies that no general answer could be provided. Not a single study on PET/CT was found.
"This lack of good studies is regrettable," the authors wrote. "PET has been applied in studies investigating patients with brain tumors since the early '80s; there would have been enough time to conduct meaningful studies."
The institute recommended that studies be conducted as quickly as possible. "As gliomas are relatively rare," they added, "ideally, several hospitals should cooperate on an international level in order to obtain robust data within a reasonable period of time."
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