Author information
1Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Department of Internal Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA.
2School of Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA.
3Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA.
4Department of Radiology, University of California, Davis, CA, USA.
5Department of Surgery, University of California, Davis, CA, USA.
6Division of Biostatistics, Department of Public Health Sciences, University of California, Davis, CA, USA.
7Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Department of Internal Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA. ssarkar@ucdavis.edu.
8Department of Radiology, University of California, Davis, CA, USA. ssarkar@ucdavis.edu.
#Contributed equally.
Abstract
Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) is a rising global disease signaling the urgent need for non-invasive tests (NITs). Recent work demonstrated that dynamic 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) positron emission tomography (PET)/computed tomography (CT) imaging can identify MASH by measuring liver glucose transport rate, K1, and liver CT attenuation. By combining dynamic PET/CT with the serum-based fibrosis-4 (FIB-4) test, we were able to better distinguish clinical MASH from fibrotic subtypes, enabling determination of the core tenets of MASH: steatosis, inflammation, and fibrosis. Future studies using FDG-PET technology can further enable concomitant prediction of MASH severity and extrahepatic comorbidities such as cardiovascular disease.