Investigation of the relationship between pre-surgical FDG-PET/CT tumor SUVmax value and the presence of post-surgical lymphovascular invasion and survival in patients diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer

It is observed that 56.5% of the lung cancer group has distant metastasis at the time of diagnosis. The presence of tumoral cells in the endothelial layer of blood or lymphatic system vessels around the tumor tissue is called LVI. The presence of LVI is considered a sign of early metastasis and poor prognosis in the patient. This study was conducted retrospectively, considering that if the presence of LVI can be predicted early, the risk of metastasis in patients will decrease and have a positive effect on survival. Patients whose preoperative FGD-PET/CT tumor SUVmax values were known and whose postoperative pathological diagnosis was NSCLC were included in the study. Patients diagnosed with NSCLC were grouped according to the presence of LVI, and it was investigated whether there was a proportionality between the presence of LVI and FGD-PET/CT tumor SUVmax values. In this retrospective study, a total of 376 patients who were operated on in our clinic between 01.01.2014 and 20.02.2023, whose preoperative FGD-PET/CT tumor SUVmax values were known and whose postoperative pathology diagnosis was NSCLC were evaluated. These patients were divided into 3 groups: those with and without the presence of LVI, adenocarcinoma-SCC-large cell carcinoma, one of the histological subtypes of NSCLC, and others. Female-male gender, age at diagnosis, tumor size, 5-year survival after surgery and overall survival rates. This study was conducted by examining FGD-PET/CT tumor SUVmax values. IBM SPSS Statitics Data Editor 2023 was used in the statistical analysis of these groups. It was observed that more than half of the results in the study were in low agreement with the results of similar studies in the literature. The reasons for this are: not questioning smoking history, not specifying tumor localization and the type of surgical procedure and resection type, not evaluating the oncological treatment status after surgery, not specifying the stage of the disease, not specifying comorbidities, etc. was considered. However, when similar studies in the literature were examined, it was seen that the presence of LVI was a sign of metastasis and poor prognosis. Additionally, studies showing a correlation between FGD-PET/CT tumor SUVmax value and the presence of LVI were seen in the literature. It was thought that our study would be beneficial to the literature.