Table 1.
The sensitivity, specificity, PPV, and NPV of PET/CT and MRI in diagnosing RLNs and CLNs in 218 patients
| Site | Test | No. of patients | FN | TP | TN | FP | Sensitivity | Specificity | PPV | NPV | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| % | 95%CI (%) | p | % | 95%CI (%) | p | % | 95%CI (%) | p | % | 95%CI (%) | p | |||||||
| Retropharyngeal lymph node metastasis | PET/CT | 79 | 22 | 57 | 123 | 16 |
72.2 (57/79) |
(62.3–82.1) |
88.5 (123/139) |
(83.2–93.8) |
78.1 (57/73) |
(68.6–87.6) |
84.8 (123/145) |
(79.0–90.6) | ||||
| MRI | 7 | 72 | 126 | 13 |
91.1 (72/79) |
(84.8–97.4) |
90.6 (126/139) |
(85.7–95.5) |
84.7 (72/85) |
(77.0–92.4) |
94.7 (126/133) |
(90.9–98.5) | ||||||
| PET/CT vs MRI | 0.004 | 0.690 | 0.284 | 0.007 | ||||||||||||||
| Neck lymph node metastasis | PET/CT | 89 | 3 | 86 | 94 | 35 |
96.6 (86/89) |
(92.8–1.0) |
72.9 (94/129) |
(65.2–80.6) |
71.1 (86/121) |
(63.0–79.2) |
96.9 (94/97) |
(93.5–1.0) | ||||
| MRI | 21 | 68 | 124 | 5 |
76.4 (68/89) |
(67.6–85.2) |
96.1 (124/129) |
(92.8–99.4) |
93.2 (68/73) |
(87.4–99.0) |
85.5 (124/145) |
(79.8–91.2) | ||||||
| PET/CT vs MRI | < 0.001 | < 0.001 | < 0.001 | 0.004 | ||||||||||||||
Statistical comparisons were made using McNemar’s paired-sample test, χ2 test
Abbreviations: RLN, retropharyngeal lymph node; CLN, cervical lymph node; CWU, conventional workup; PET/CT, 18F_fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography; FN, false negative; TP, true positive; TN, true negative; FP, false positive; PPV, positive predictive value; NPV, negative predictive value