Early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease with FDG-PET

Early diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease with FDG-PET

Kengo Ito, Takashi Kato

Department of Brain Science and Molecular Imaging, National Institute for Longevity
Sciences, National Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology

Although there are already many reports about the usefulness of positron emission tomography with FDG (FDG-PET) in diagnosis of Alzheimer disease (AD) and scientific evidence has been established, further improvement in diagnostic accuracy can be achieved by using statistical image analysis, such as SPM and 3D-SSP. FDG-PET is also expected to be able to predict conversion to AD in patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and establishment of the scientific evidence by prospective clinical trial is indispensable. FDG-PET can play an important role in clinical trials for developing new therapeutic drugs for AD.

Address correspondence to Dr. Kengo Ito, Department of Brain Science and Molecular Imaging, National Institute for Longevity Sciences, National Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology (36-3 Gengo Morioka-cho, Obu-shi, Aichi 474-8511, Japan)