PET/CT: Interpretative Pitfalls in the Thorax.

In PET/CT evaluation of thoracic malignancies, knowledge of common pitfalls and artifacts that can mimic pathology is important to avoid misinterpretation. These pitfalls include physiologic uptake in striated muscle or brown fat, malignancies that are not [18F]-fluoro-2-deoxy-d-glucose (FDG) avid, and FDG avid benign processes. Artifacts include misregistration of PET and CT images due to cardiac or respiratory motion, and high attenuation materials on CT. Specific protocols for patient preparation and imaging acquisition, review of both the attenuation-corrected and nonattenuation-corrected PET images, and correlation with clinical history can help to improve diagnostic accuracy of PET/CT.