Demonstration of focal physiologic in-vivo somatostatin receptor expression in the caput epididymis of the testes on 68Ga-DOTANOC PET/CT and 177Lu-DOTATATE post-therapy whole body scintigraphy

• Main Authors: Ashwin Parihar, Apurva Sood, Ashwani Sood, Ajay Gulati, Bhagwant Mittal
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Mashhad University of Medical Sciences 2020-07-01
• Series: Asia Oceania Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Biology
• Subjects: 68ga-dotanoc- pet/ct; testicular uptake; physiologic neuroendocrine tumor; 177lu-dotatate; somatostatin receptor; dotatoc
• Online Access: http://aojnmb.mums.ac.ir/article_15544_1b774850c10d4dc8fe286c728e3ac236.pdf

We present the case of a 60-year-old man with metastatic neuroendocrine tumor of the ileum following ileal resection, being evaluated for ¹⁷⁷Lu-based peptide receptor radionuclide therapy. ⁶⁸Ga-DOTANOC PET/CT showed focal increased tracer uptake in the scrotal region without any morphologic changes on the corresponding CT images. Similar increased tracer uptake was seen on post-therapy whole-body imaging following ¹⁷⁷Lu-DOTATATE therapy. An USG guided FNA revealed no malignant cells on cytopathologic examination. This case illustrates that focal testicular tracer uptake, may not always be pathological and can represent a normal physiologic variant, similar to the diffuse testicular somatostatin receptor expression as previously reported in literature.