Role in staging and prognostic value of pretherapeutic F-18 FDG PET/CT in patients with gastric MALT lymphoma without high-grade transformation

The purpose of this retrospective study was to investigate the role in staging and prognostic value of pretherapeutic fluorine-18-fluorodeoxyglucose (F-18 FDG) positron emission tomography (PET)/computed tomography (CT) in patients with gastric mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT) lymphoma without high-grade transformation (HT). We retrospectively reviewed 115 consecutive patients with histopathologically confirmed gastric MALT lymphoma without HT who underwent pretherapeutic F-18 FDG PET/CT. Kaplan–Meier and Cox proportional-hazards regression analyses were used to identify independent prognostic factors for disease free survival (DFS) among 13 clinical parameters and three PET parameters. In two of 115 patients (1.7%), the clinical stage appeared higher according to F-18 FDG PET/CT. In univariate analysis, Helicobacter pylori (HP) infection (P = 0.023), treatment modality (P < 0.001), and stage including PET/CT (P = 0.015) were significant prognostic factors for DFS. In multivariate analysis, only treatment modality was an independent prognostic factor (P = 0.003). In conclusion, F-18 FDG PET/CT played an important role in enabling upstaging of patients with gastric MALT lymphoma without HT. F-18 FDG PET/CT may have a prognostic role in gastric MALT lymphoma without HT by contributing to better staging.