Positron Emission Tomography in Extrapulmonary Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis (TB) remains a major public health problem. In extra-pulmonary forms, evidence of bacteriological cure is difficult to be obtained raising the need for other therapeutic assessment tools. 18F-Fluoro-deoxy-glucose (FDG) is a glucose analogue widely used in Positron Emission Tomography (PET). Its uptake is high in cancer cells and in inflammatory cells, especially in active TB foci. The hypothesis is a decrease in the uptake of FDG in the foci of TB during treatment permitting a non-invasive monitoring of therapeutic response. The main objective is to describe the evolution under treatment of the FDG uptake in PET imaging in TB foci in patients cured from lymph node and bone TB. Secondary objectives are to compare the decrease of FDG uptake according to type of location, to define the frequency of localizations revealed by FDG-PET and their impact on therapeutic management at the beginning and the end of treatment, and to describe the evolution of PET in patients not cured.