scholarly journals Diffuse Cystic Metastases in the Lung after Nivolumab Treatment in a Patient with Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: A Case Report

2021 ◽  
pp. 34-38
Author(s):  
Satoshi Muto ◽  
Yuki Ozaki ◽  
Takuya Inoue ◽  
Naoyuki Okabe ◽  
Yuki Matsumura ◽  
...  

Although diffuse cysts in the lung can be found in many diseases, they are uncommon in metastatic lung adenocarcinoma. They are even more unusual after the administration of immune checkpoint inhibitors. A case of lung adenocarcinoma that developed diffuse cysts in the lungs during treatment with nivolumab is reported. The patient was a 60-year-old woman with postoperative recurrent lung adenocarcinoma in mediastinal lymph nodes and pleural dissemination. After first-line treatment with cisplatin, pemetrexed, and bevacizumab, computed tomography (CT) showed disease progression. Treatment was then switched to nivolumab. After 5 courses of nivolumab, CT showed multiple ground-glass nodules in her lungs. After 4 more courses of nivolumab, the ground-glass nodules increased in size, and cystic air spaces appeared in their centers. The patient did not have any symptoms. Laboratory tests showed no evidence of infection or nivolumab-induced pneumonitis. Sialyl Lewis X-i antigen increased, and positron emission tomography showed abnormal uptake of 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose in these lesions. Considering this evidence, the cystic lesions were diagnosed as multiple lung metastases. Various differential diagnoses should be considered when diffuse cystic lesions are found in the lungs after the administration of immune checkpoint inhibitors.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stéphane Ederhy ◽  
Perrine Devos ◽  
Bruno Pinna ◽  
Elisa Funck-Brentano ◽  
Baptiste Abbar ◽  
...  

Abstract Immune-checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) have profoundly improved the prognosis of cancer patients but are associated with life-threatening myocarditis (incidence≤1%).The diagnosis of ICI-myocarditis remains challenging necessitating the need for novel diagnostic strategies.This single center cohort included 61 consecutive patients referred to our cardio-oncology unit for a suspicion of ICI-myocarditis with a positive troponin, between March 2019 and March 2021. In the 31 patients with suspected ICI-myocarditis with available FDG-PET, the median delay between admission and the first available FDG-PET performed was 12 days [interquartile-range:9-30]. Patients received ICI (ICI-monotherapy: 24/31, 77% and ICI-combination therapy: 7/31, 23%), mainly for lung cancer (n=10), melanoma (n=5), and kidney cancer (n=3). FDG-PET was performed using a standardized protocol involving dietary measures prior to PET, including fasting of at least 6h and a fat enriched diet without carbohydrates for 24h. FDG-PET platforms included Biograph-mCT-Flow Siemens (n=9/34, 26%) or Discovery-MI-5-Ring General Electric (n=25/34, 74%) devices and analysed using Singo.via Workstation (Siemens) by a nuclear medicine physician blinded to patients’ medical records. Interpretation of FDG-PET was based on the following classification: 1/No FDG uptake, 2/Diffuse FDG uptake, 3/Focal FDG uptake, 4/Focal on diffuse FDG uptake.An abnormal cardiac fixation on FDG-PET suggestive of myocarditis was observed in only 2/21 (9.5%) patients with otherwise definite ICI-myocarditis (1 diffuse, 1 focal), not different in proportion versus 1/7 (14.3%, 1 focal) patient without ICI-myocarditis (p>0.99). The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive and negative predictive values (with their 95% confidence-interval) of FDG-PET for ICI-myocarditis was 9.5% (1.2-30.4%), 85.7% (42.1-99.6%), 66% (17.5-95%), 24% (18.5-30.6%), respectively. Only 2/14(14.2%) FDG-PET were positive despite being performed at a time in which ICI-myocarditis was fully active with troponin levels over ten-times the normal values versus 0/6(0%,p>0.99) for FDG-PET performed when troponin levels were abnormal but below ten-times the upper limit. Similarly, there was no difference in FDG-PET positivity rate for exams performed within 14 days (1/7, 14.3%; plus 3 inconclusive exams) versus those performed after 14 days (1/14, 7.2%; no inconclusive exams; p>0.99) of hospital admission.Altogether, our study suggests that FDG-PET has a limited diagnostic value for the diagnosis of ICI-Myocarditis.


2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matteo Bauckneht ◽  
Roberta Piva ◽  
Gianmario Sambuceti ◽  
Francesco Grossi ◽  
Silvia Morbelli

2021 ◽  
Vol 109 (2) ◽  
pp. 594-602 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Helm ◽  
Walter Tinganelli ◽  
Palma Simoniello ◽  
Fuki Kurosawa ◽  
Claudia Fournier ◽  
...  

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Jia-Wei Luo ◽  
Yan-Hua Guo ◽  
Feng-Ying Wu ◽  
Xue-Fei Li ◽  
Xue-Cheng Sun ◽  
...  

Recent clinical trials of lung adenocarcinoma with immune checkpoint inhibitors revealed that lung adenocarcinoma patients with EGFR mutations have a poor response to immunotherapy. However, the mechanisms have not been addressed. We performed immunohistochemistry analyses of resected lung adenocarcinoma tissues with and without EGFR mutations to investigate and compare the characteristics of the tumor microenvironment (TME). We retrospectively enrolled a total of 323 lung adenocarcinoma patients (164 had EGFR mutations), and their corresponding tissue samples were analyzed by the EGFR mutation test and immunohistochemistry. We selected the markers of the immune checkpoint molecule (PD1, PD-L1, and LAG-3) and immune cell (CD3, CD4, CD8, and Foxp3) as markers of the tumor microenvironment. Our results revealed that patients had a distinct tumor microenvironment between EGFR-mutant and wild-type lung adenocarcinomas; the expression of CD3, CD4, PD-L1, and Foxp3 in EGFR-mutant tumors was significantly higher than that in wild-type tumors, while the expression of LAG3 and PD-1 showed a positive correlation with EGFR-wild-type tumors. In survival analysis, EGFR-wild-type patients had longer disease-free survival (DFS) than EGFR-mutant patients ( P = 0.0065 ). Our research demonstrates significant differences in tumor microenvironment composition between EGFR-mutant and wild-type patients. Our findings provide novel evidence that contributes to understanding the mechanism underlying the poor efficacy of immune checkpoint inhibitors.


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