Emerging role of functional imaging in renal cell carcinoma: from morphology to molecular phenotyping with PET/computed tomography

Abstract

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Functional imaging in renal cell carcinoma (RCC), particularly in clear-cell (ccRCC), has accelerated over the past decade. Rapidly developing novel radiotracers signal growing clinical reliance for better diagnosis, staging and prognostication. This review highlights recent important publications in PET/CT imaging of ccRCC. RECENT FINDINGS: 18 F-FDG PET/CT has limited RCC staging value owing to renal excretion and variable tumour uptake. 68 Ga-PSMA PET/CT performs better, but uptake is not tumour-specific and related to neovasculature. Meanwhile, CA-IX-targeted tracers leverage a marker highly overexpressed in ccRCC, delivering high tumour-to-background ratio and superior..