Potential of 18 F-FDG-PET as a valuable adjunct to clinical and response assessment in rheumatoid arthritis and seronegative spondyloarthropathies

Figure 1 Images of response assessment in rheumatoid arthritis. The patient on the left side was a responder and right side was a non-responder. A: A good response to the hydroxyquinone, methotrexate and prednisolone treatment (at 6 wk) on follow up scan. The pre treatment maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) values were 10.6 in right wrist which fell to 4.0 on post treatment scan; B: An example of non-responder. The pre treatment SUVmax value was 2.9 while that of post treatment with hydroxyquinolone, methotrexate and prednisolone was 4.3. The similarity of the uptake in pre and post treatment scan made it difficult to interpret progression on visual basis. The patient had no symptomatic relief clinically.