Purpose: This study aimed to investigate whether metabolic tumor volume (MTV) measured from [(18)F]-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography (FDG-PET/CT) predicts short-term outcome to radiotherapy with or without chemotherapy and disease-free survival (DFS) in patients with pharyngeal cancers.
Experimental design: The MTVs of primary sites with or without neck nodes were measured in 82 patients. Short-term outcome was assessed using the treatment response evaluation by the Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors and recurrence events during follow-up (complete response/no recurrence or residual disease/recurrence).
Results: A total of 64 patients had complete response/no recurrence as of the last follow-up. A cutoff of 40 mL for the MTV was the best discriminative value for predicting treatment response. By univariate analyses, patients with MTV > 40 mL showed a significantly lower number of complete response/no recurrence than did patients with MTV < or =40 mL [68.2% versus 87.8%; hazard ratio (HR), 3.34; 95% confidence interval (95% CI), 1.09-10.08; P = 0.03], as is the same in tumor-node-metastasis stage (87.5% for I-II versus 90% for III versus 63.8% for IV; P = 0.02). However, MTV was only a significant predictor of short-term outcome by multivariate analyses (HR, 4.09; 95% CI, 1.02-16.43; P = 0.04). MTV > 40 mL indicated a significantly worse DFS than MTV < or =40 mL (HR, 3.42; 95% CI, 1.04-11.26;P = 0.04). The standardized uptake value for the primary tumor did not show any correlation with treatment outcome or DFS.
Conclusion: MTV has a potential value in predicting short-term outcome and DFS in patients with pharyngeal cancers.