Clinicians Question Usefulness of Multiple Post-Treatment PET/CT Scans for Head and Neck Cancer

A more recent retrospective analysis co-authored by Mike Yao, MD, clinical associate professor of otolaryngology at New York Medical College in Valhalla, instead suggests that patients with negative three-month scans derive limited benefit from subsequent PET/CT surveillance (Cancer. 2013;119:1349-1356). “What we say in the paper is that you probably should only use it if you have some sort of suspicion: The patient might have pain or there might be swelling; there might be something there that you can’t account for,” he said. “If you can’t find a problem, PET/CT probably isn’t going to change that patient’s outcome at all.”

Nevertheless, Dr. Yao said his group’s results are unlikely to yield much change in physician behavior, due to lingering perceptions that a PET/CT scan remains a sensitive method for detecting recurrences. “Unless someone comes in and says, ‘You need to save some money and this is not a good use of resources,’” he said, “I think doctors are going to continue to order them.”