Side-effect of chemotherapy on liver in lymphoma patients studied by standard uptake value.

Abstract

The aim of this thesis study is to ascertain if there are changes in F-18 FDG uptake in the liver after chemotherapy R-CHOP in patients having diffuse large B-cell non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. PET using 18 F-FDG is used to detect enhanced glycolysis in cancer cells and has proven to be valuable in diagnosis, staging and assessing response to therapy in a multitude of malignant disorder. PET/CT images of 19 patients both male and female, aged between 48 to 80 years was analyzed in the present study. PET/CT scan of the patients were taken one week before, one week after, one month after and four months after chemotherapy. The images in all these cases were analyzed for changes in F-18 FDG uptake in liver before the treatment with R-CHOP and in different period after treatment. The changes were quantified by means of standard uptake value. The changes in standard uptake value were also compared with changes in liver function test before and one month after chemotherapy. The present study demonstrates there are changes in alanine aminotransferase, alkaline phosphatase and mean 18 F-FDG uptake in liver by R-CHOP chemotherapy in patients with diffuse large B-cell Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. However, the decrease in ALT and AFOS value was not significant one month after chemotherapy.