( PET scans can detect twice the number o...)PET Scanner detects more Vaginal cancer than CT scans,Health

PET scans can detect twice the number of vaginal cancer and cancerous lymph//nodes than CT scans. This was the finding from researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. An article has appeared in the July 1st issue of the ‘International Journal of Radiation Oncology, Biology, Physics’ and this may change the future gold standard for early detection of cancers of this region. According to study author Perry W. Grigsby, M.D., professor of radiation oncology and radiology, ‘The results of this study suggest that the use of PET, or positron emission tomography, would make diagnosis of vaginal cancer much more accurate and allow better selection of treatment’.

The vaginal cancer progresses in the known fashion, and if the staging of the tumour can be accurately predicted before treatment were to start the doctors can be sure of the modality of the treatment and where to target radiation treatment.

"In 1999, we began publishing papers showing that PET scans picked up more cancerous lymph nodes in patients with cervical cancer," Grigsby says.

PET scans and CT scans have different methods of detecting tumours. The CT scan obtains cross-sectional views of the body by detecting the amount of X-rays that pass through the body's tissues. CT scans can miss small tumors, whereas PET scans detect radioactivity that emanates directly from a tumor after a patient has received a dose of radioactive glucose, which accumulates in tumors. Hence even tiny tumors will collect enough "hot" glucose to show up on the PET scan.

"CT scans are useful in many cases, but they have a limit to their resolution," says Grigsby, who sees patients at the Siteman Cancer Center and is affiliated with Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's Hospitals. "When you're evaluating lymph nodes for cancer using CT, the node has to be at least a centimeter for it to be considered abnormal. But PET scans can detect much smaller nodes that ha
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