Diagnosis of pancreatic focal nesidioblastosis assisted by dual‑nuclide tracer positron emission tomography/computed tomography: A case report.

Abstract

Nesidioblastosis is a rare cause of hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia in adults and its clinical features are similar to those of insulinoma with recurrent hypoglycemic attacks. The present study reports the case of a 48-year-old man who visited the Affiliated Hospital of Zunyi Medical University (Zunyi, China) with a 5-year history of recurrent hypoglycemic symptoms such as dizziness and palpitations. Abdominal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) showed a mass of ~1.2x1.0 cm in the head of the pancreas, which was suspected to be an insulinoma. For confirmation, the patient underwent both fluorine-18-fluorodeoxyglucose (¹⁸F-FDG) and gallium-68-labeled 1,4,7,10-tetraazacyclododecane-1,4,7,10-teraacetic acid-d-Phel-Tyr3-Thr8-OC (⁶⁸Ga-DOTATATE) positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT), which showed a moderately increased uptake of ¹⁸F-FDG but no uptake of ⁶⁸Ga-DOTATATE in the corresponding lesion. The patient subsequently underwent surgery to remove the lesion, which was pathologically confirmed as a pancreatic nesidioblastosis. This case showed that nesidioblastosis should be considered a differential diagnosis for insulinoma and that dual nuclear tracer PET/CT imaging is helpful for differentiating between the two. If conventional imaging techniques such as ultrasound, CT and MRI cannot identify the cause of hypoglycemia in future cases, dual-nuclide tracer PET/CT imaging should be considered.