Table 3.

Main characteristics of imaging modalities used in cSCC.

Imaging Modality	Optimal Use in cSCC	Advantages	Disadvantages	Sensitivity/Specificity for H&N Nodal Disease a
CT	Bone or lymph node disease	Less expensive, more widely available, and faster image acquisition than MRI	Exposure to contrast dye and ionizing radiation	52%/93%
MRI	Perineural, CNS, deep soft tissue, BM, or lymph node disease	No exposure to ionizing radiation	Less widely available, longer acquisition time, more expensive than CT	65%/81%
US	Superficial lymph node disease and image-guided FNA	Least expensive, no exposure to contrast dye or ionizing radiation, rapid image acquisition, global accessibility	Operator and technique-dependent, limited visualization of deep structures	66%/78%
PET/CT	Distant metastases	Functional and anatomic information, distinguishes postoperative scar tissue from recurrence	Most expensive, lesions less than 10 mm are below resolution for FDG-PET	66%/87%

BM, bone marrow; CNS, central nervous system; cSCC, cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma; CT, computed tomography; FDG, fluorodeoxyglucose; FNA, fine needle aspiration; H&N, head and neck; MRI, magnetic resonance imaging; PET, positron emission tomography; US, ultrasonography. ^a Adapted from Liao et al., 2012 [39].