Xeleris

All patients fasted for at least 6 hours before receiving PET/CT examination. Their blood glucose levels were then suitable for intravenous injection of ¹⁸F-FDG. The PET images were reconstructed by attenuation and iterative reconstruction, then multi-layered, multi-imaged, and merged with the CT images to ensure image clarity. This procedure was conducted by manufacturer review workstation (Xeleris™; GE Healthcare Bio-Sciences Corp., Piscataway, NJ, USA). The SUVmax and SUVmean parameters of the primary tumor area were automatically captured and calculated. In our study, MTV was defined as the sum of the primary tumor metabolic volumes using a SUVmax of 2.5 as the threshold.15 (link),16 (link)

Patients were asked to fast for at least 4 hours before undergoing the examination. All patients had glucose levels below 150 mg/dL. The patients received an intravenous injection of 370 to 666 MBq (10–18 mCi) of ¹⁸F-FDG. Data acquisitions were performed 60 to 120 minutes after injection using an integrated in-line PET/CT system (Discovery 690; GE Medical Systems, Milwaukee). Data acquisition was as follows: CT scanning was performed first followed by PET scan with acquisition time of 4 minutes per each table position. PET image datasets were reconstructed iteratively by using CT data for attenuation correction, and coregistered images were displayed on a workstation (Xeleris, GE, Haifa, Israel).

Dogs received an intravenous injection of 629 MBq (22.2 MBq/kg) of ^{99 m}TcO₄⁻ (left distal cephalic vein) and were anaesthetized as described above. Scintigraphic static acquisitions were performed on the same day as the cell injections (4 h after injection), at 48 h, 7 days, and 30 days after using an Infinia II 3/8 Hawkeye Hybrid NM/CT (GE) with low energy high-resolution collimators and energy window peaked at 140 keV.
The same imaging protocol was applied for each dog at each acquisition: first, at 45 min after ^{99 m}TcO₄⁻ injection, a whole body planar acquisition (20 min) was performed, using a 256 × 256 matrix and a pixel size of 2.21 × 2.21 mm. Then a SPECT/CT sequence lasting 30 min was performed at the level of the thoracic or pelvic limbs, depending on the injection sites. A SPECT sequence lasting 20 min was performed using a 128 × 128 matrix, a pixel size of 4.42 × 4.42 mm, and acquisitions of images at 30 different positions of the dual head camera, over a 360° rotation, each projection being acquired during 40 s. A CT lasting 10 min was then performed, at 140 kV, 2.5 mA, and with a slice thickness of 10 mm. The images were reconstructed in the Xeleris (GE) workstation.
For cell dishes imaging, the plates were positioned directly on one of the collimators, a 256 × 256 matrix was used, and the size of pixels was 2.21 × 2.21. The static acquisition lasted 5 min.