Cardiac Metastasis from Prostate Cancer: A Case Study Underlying the Crucial Role of the PSMA PET/CT

Diagnostics (Basel). 2023 Aug 23;13(17):2733. doi: 10.3390/diagnostics13172733.

Abstract

Prostate cancer still represents one of the most frequent cancers and causes of death worldwide, despite the huge therapeutic advances in the last decades. The introduction into clinical practice of prostate-specific membrane antigen positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PSMA PET/CT) has significantly improved diagnostic capacity, allowing for the identification of lesions previously undetectable. The case we are presenting is about a 90-year-old man affected by metastatic prostate cancer and treated with hormonal therapies. At the second progression, the restaging with PSMA PET/CT pointed out a millimetric cardiac intra-atrial metastasis, on which little/scarce literature data are still available. On one hand, this finding confirms the high sensitivity of this technique, which should be preferred over traditional imaging. On the other hand, it suggests that introducing next-generation imaging into clinical practice may provide novel insights about prostate cancer metastatic spread.

Keywords: PSMA PET/CT; intracardiac metastasis; prostate cancer; uncommon metastatic site.

Grants and funding

This research received no external funding. The APC was funded by the Italian Ministry of Health (Ricerca Corrente 2023 grants, CDC T18R1 – funding number N713A).