CT false positives?

I had liver lesions show up on the CT that turned out to be benign, what didn't show up was a bone met, both the CT and bone scans missed that one, a PET scan found it.  An MRI was then done and it showed severe thinning of the bone in that spot that a plain old fashioned xray proved was false. 

Don't let yourself get too bent out of shape yet, these scans are wonderful diagnostic tools but they are far from being perfect.

Hi Pod,

When I was diagnosed in 2005, they did the typical tests before my bi-lat. mastectomy including a CT scan.  They found some hypodensities on the liver.  I was 53 years old.  This became a long story which I won't go into here; but my oncs office wanted me to cancel surgery which was going to be done the next day on a Saturday because my breast surgeon and I are friends.  The oncs office wanted an ultrasound of the liver.  My son was in medical school at the time and before the surgery the next day, he met me at the hospital to view the ultrasound and asked to see the CT scan.  They couldn't find the hypodensities on the ultrasound and the radiologist told my son that if it were her mother she would advise her to go through with the surgery because at 50 years old almost everyone has something on the liver usually fatty deposits.  She said that if it weren't for the bc, more than likely they wouldn't even be concerned about them.  I hope this helps and I also hope that you get good news on Tuesday.  So far, my liver is fine.  By the way, I'm from St. Charles, MO.  Who is your oncologist and what hospital are you going to?

God bless,

Chris

From someone who works in radiology (MRI) I can tell you you that we find benign things all the time.  The more scans you have the more suspicious things will pop up.  Most of them are nothing and you can drive your self crazy if you have too many of them.  Most people that work in radiology wont get in the scanner themselves because of this very reason.