Guidelines for F-FDG PET and PET-CT imaging in paediatric oncology

Objective The purpose of these guidelines is to offer to the nuclear medicine team a framework that could prove helpful in daily practice. These guidelines contain information related to the indications, acquisition, processing and interpretation of F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography (FFDG PET) in paediatric oncology. The Oncology Committee of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine (EANM) has published excellent procedure guidelines on tumour imaging with F-FDG PET (Bombardieri et al., Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging 30:BP115–24, 2003 [2]. These guidelines, published by the EANM Paediatric Committee, do not intend to compete with the existing guidelines, but rather aim at providing additional information on issues particularly relevant to PET imaging of children with cancer. Conclusion The guidelines summarize the views of the Paediatric Committee of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine. They should be taken in the context of “good practice” of nuclear medicine and of any national rules, which may apply to nuclear medicine examinations. The recommendations of these guidelines cannot be applied to all patients in all practice settings. The guidelines should not be deemed Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging DOI 10.1007/s00259-008-0826-x Under the Auspices of the Paediatric Committee of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine. J. Stauss (*) Department of Radiology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA e-mail: [email protected] C. Franzius MR and PET/CT-Centre, Bremen-Mitte, Bremen, Germany T. Pfluger :K. Hahn Department of Nuclear Medicine, Ludwig-Maximilians-University, Munich, Germany K. U. Juergens Department of Clinical Radiology, University Hospital Muenster, Muenster, Germany L. Biassoni : J. Begent Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust, London, UK R. Kluge Department of Nuclear Medicine, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany H. Amthauer : T. Voelker Campus Virchow-Klinikum, Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Berlin, Germany L. Højgaard Department of Clinical Physiology and Nuclear Medicine and PET and Cyclotron Unit, Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen University Hospital, Copenhagen, Denmark S. Barrington PET Imaging Centre at St. Thomas’, Guy’s, King’s and St. Thomas’ School of Medicine, London, UK S. Hain University College Hospitals NHS Trust, London, UK T. Lynch Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast, UK inclusive of all proper procedures or exclusive of other procedures reasonably directed to obtaining the same results.