Background: Patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) show heterogeneity in clinical progression rate, and we have limited tools to predict prognosis. Amyloid burden from 18F-Flutemetamol positron emission tomography (PET), as measured by standardized uptake value ratios (SUVR), might provide prognostic information.
Objective: We investigate whether 18F-Flutemetamol PET composite or regional SUVRs are associated with trajectories of clinical progression.
Methods: This observational longitudinal study included 94 patients with clinical AD. PET images were semi-quantified with normalization to pons. Group-based trajectory modeling was applied to identify trajectory groups according to change in the Clinical Dementia Rating Scale Sum of Boxes (CDR-SB) over time. Multinomial logistic regression models assessed the association of SUVRs with trajectory group membership.
Results: Three trajectory groups were identified. In the regression models, neither composite nor regional SUVRs were associated with trajectory group membership.
Conclusion: There were no associations between CDR progression and 18F-Flutemetamol PET-derived composite SUVRs or regional SUVRs in clinical AD.
Keywords: Alzheimer’s disease; Flutemetamol; PET-CT; amyloid-β; clinical progression; trajectories.