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Quantification of 18F-florbetapir PET: comparison of two analysis methods

European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging volume 42, pages 725–732 (2015)Cite this article

Abstract

Purpose

18F-Florbetapir positron emission tomography (PET) can be used to image amyloid burden in the human brain. A previously developed research method has been shown to have a high test-retest reliability and good correlation between standardized uptake value ratio (SUVR) and amyloid burden at autopsy. The goal of this study was to determine how well SUVRs computed using the research method could be reproduced using an automatic quantification method, developed for clinical use.

Methods

Two methods for the quantitative analysis of 18F-florbetapir PET were compared in a diverse clinical population of 604 subjects from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) and in a group of 74 younger healthy controls (YHC). Cortex to cerebellum SUVRs were calculated using the research method, which is based on SPM, yielding ‘research SUVRs’, and using syngo.PET Amyloid Plaque, yielding ‘sPAP SUVRs’.

Results

Mean cortical SUVRs calculated using the two methods for the 678 subjects were correlated (r = 0.99). Linear regression of sPAP SUVRs on research SUVRs was used to convert the research method SUVR threshold for florbetapir positivity of 1.10 to a corresponding threshold of 1.12 for sPAP. Using the corresponding thresholds, categorization of SUVR values were in agreement between research and sPAP SUVRs for 96.3 % of the ADNI images. SUVRs for all YHC were below the corresponding thresholds.

Conclusion

Automatic florbetapir PET quantification using sPAP yielded cortex to cerebellum SUVRs which were correlated and in good agreement with the well-established research method. The research SUVR threshold for florbetapir positivity was reliably converted to a corresponding threshold for sPAP SUVRs.

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Acknowledgments

Data collection and sharing for this project was funded by the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) (National Institutes of Health Grant U01 AG024904) and DOD ADNI (Department of Defense award number W81XWH-12-2-0012). ADNI is funded by the National Institute on Aging, the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, and through generous contributions from the following: Alzheimer’s Association; Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation; Araclon Biotech; BioClinica, Inc.; Biogen Idec Inc.; Bristol-Myers Squibb Company; Eisai Inc.; Elan Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; Eli Lilly and Company; EuroImmun; F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd and its affiliated company Genentech, Inc.; Fujirebio; GE Healthcare;; IXICO Ltd.; Janssen Alzheimer Immunotherapy Research & Development, LLC.; Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research & Development LLC.; Medpace, Inc.; Merck & Co., Inc.; Meso Scale Diagnostics, LLC.; NeuroRx Research; Neurotrack Technologies; Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation; Pfizer Inc.; Piramal Imaging; Servier; Synarc Inc.; and Takeda Pharmaceutical Company. The Canadian Institutes of Health Research is providing funds to support ADNI clinical sites in Canada. Private sector contributions are facilitated by the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (www.fnih.org). The grantee organization is the Northern California Institute for Research and Education, and the study is coordinated by the Alzheimer's Disease Cooperative Study at the University of California, San Diego. ADNI data are disseminated by the Laboratory for Neuro Imaging at the University of Southern California.

Compliance with ethical standards

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Conflicts of interest

Chloe Hutton and Jerome Declerck are employees of Siemens Healthcare Molecular Imaging. Mark A. Mintun, Michael J. Pontecorvo, Michael D. Devous, Sr., and Abhinay D. Joshi are employees of Avid Radiopharmaceuticals Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Eli Lilly and company.

Human participants

Data used in this study were obtained from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) database with agreement under the terms of the ADNI Data Use Agreement. Submission of data to the ADNI database was approved by the Institutional Review Boards of all of the participating institutions. Informed written consent was obtained from all participants at each site.

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Affiliations

  1. Siemens Molecular Imaging, Oxford, UK

    Chloe Hutton & Jerome Declerck

  2. Avid Radiopharmaceuticals a wholly owned subsidiary of Eli Lilly and Company, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Mark A. Mintun, Michael J. Pontecorvo, Michael D. Devous Sr. & Abhinay D. Joshi

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  1. Chloe Hutton
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  2. Jerome Declerck
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  3. Mark A. Mintun
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  4. Michael J. Pontecorvo
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  5. Michael D. Devous Sr.
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  6. Abhinay D. Joshi
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for the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Chloe Hutton.

Additional information

Data used in preparation of this article were obtained from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) database (adni.loni.usc.edu). As such, the investigators within the ADNI contributed to the design and implementation of ADNI and/or provided data but did not participate in analysis or writing of this report. A complete listing of ADNI investigators can be found at: http://adni.loni.usc.edu/wp-content/uploads/how_to_apply/ADNI_Acknowledgement_List.pdf

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Hutton, C., Declerck, J., Mintun, M.A. et al. Quantification of 18F-florbetapir PET: comparison of two analysis methods. Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging 42, 725–732 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00259-015-2988-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00259-015-2988-7

Keywords

  • Amyloid
  • Florbetapir
  • PET
  • Quantification
  • Alzheimer’s disease