Hard to say but the appointment letter for my CT scan usually states which part of my body they plan to scan, it might be worth checking the letter again.
Mine usually says either chest and thorax, or chest, thorax and pelvis.
Failing that, you could ask your oncologist or phone the CT department, though if your husband's head didn't go inside the "doughnut" it won't have been scanned.
Dave is right about the CT scan but in my experience the PET normally does the whole body. You are injected with glucose which apparently cancerous cells absorb and show up that there is activity in those places - and how much activity. It is a good tool to see if the cancer has spread to other areas.
It is a good idea to ask the radiology team what was scanned though and it will stop you wondering about it, so give them a call on Monday and put your mind at ease.
I hope the results are good and that treatment works well for your husband x
Hi Gintonic, I have had several PET scans and I did ask that exact question - about the brain. I was told that they can't do a brain PET scan, (anything higher than your neck) because the brain has so much electric activity going on all the time that they would never get a reading on the brain. A PET scan lights up any cancers/tumors in the body that are cancerous, hence a PET on the brain just wouldn't take. They can do a regular scan on the brain, (the scan where you are not given a sugar injection, but likely a dye injection). It might be a good idea to ask your doctor to explain this to you and your husband. A PET scan will scan the entire body, other than the brain, so any cancers in the body will be detected. A PET scan is really the cadilac of scans.
Good luck with it and come back and let us know how your husband gets along.
Thats really odd because following a PET scan in January, I was told that there was activity showing in the brain and I needed an MRI to look at it in more detail. After the MRI it was confirmed as a tumour. x
I am one of the enquiry nurses and am posting because Lucie our moderator asked us if we might be able to clarify what scans can do. Scanning technology is a complex area of medicine so I’m afraid I am a bit out of my depth but as far as I know FDG-PET scans aren’t always so useful in picking up brain tumours because of high levels of uptake in the normal brain which is what Lorraine seems to have been told. CT or MRI scans are usually the mainstay of brain imaging often with the aid of a contrast medium.
PET and CT scans can be combined. Some places do PET-CT scans from the top of the head to the mid- thigh and others start from the base of the skull excluding the brain as a standard and I don’t think the sort of contrast medium used in CT scans are given as a standard either. But the doctors can ask for the scan to include the brain or the rest of the legs if they think it is needed and they can request a contrast CT scan as well.
I think the answer to Ginnntonic’s original question will depend on what the standard practice is at her husband's hospital and also what his doctors asked for.
