Incidence of suspicious axillary lymph node involvement in fluorine-18 fluoro-D-glucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography in gynecologic cancers

OBJECTIVE: There is scarce information about axillary lymph node involvement in gynecologic cancers. We analyzed the incidence of suspicious axillary lymph nodes in gynecologic cancers. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed the positron emission tomography/computed tomography findings of 251 patients with endometrial, cervical, and ovarian cancer. There is no cut-off value documented for axillary metastases from gynecologic cancers; therefore we adopted the cut-off standardized uptake values (SUVs) proclaimed in breast cancer. RESULTS: A total of 251 patients records were available for analysis; 40 patients (15.9%) with suspicious axillary lymph nodes were included in the study. Twenty-one and a half percent (n=20/93) of patients with endometrium cancer, 14.1% (n=14/99) of patients with ovarian cancer, and 10% (n=6/59) of those with cervical cancer had suspicious axillary lymph nodes. Patients with an maximum SUV (SUV(max)) uptake higher than 3 underwent axillary lymph node biopsy. None of them was found to have axillary metastases of gynecologic cancers in the pathologic evaluation. In one patient with endometrial cancer, an obscure breast ductal carcinoma was diagnosed, another patient with endometrial cancer was found to have follicular lymphoma. The third patient with endometrial cancer had no malignancy in axillary lymph node biopsy, but had Hurthle cell neoplasia in a thyroid biopsy; the patient did not accept any surgical or medical treatment for endometrial cancer and died 23 months later. There were three (7.5%) metachronous cancers out of 40 gynecologic cancers; two patients were explained above, the third patient with endometrium cancer, who was not histopathologically evaluated although the axillary SUV(max) was <3, had rectosigmoid cancer and glioblastoma metachronously. CONCLUSION: Our study shows that an important ratio (14-21%) of patients with gynecologic cancer has suspicious axillary lymph nodes. Increased SUV(max), particularly above 3, might be used as an indication for axillary biopsy and may help to identify secondary metastatic cancer.