European Nuclear Medicine Congress Focuses on PET Nuclear Technology: Where Is the Boundary of Early Diagnosis

On October 19, 2026, at the plenary session of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine Congress (EANM 2026) held in Vienna, Austria, Professor Paola·Anna·Erba, President of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine, raised the major issue of “when prevention is early enough.” The conference held in-depth discussions on whether positron emission tomography (PET), a core nuclear medicine imaging technology, can detect cancer, cardiovascular disease, and Alzheimer's disease before symptoms appear.

Regarding PET-based cancer screening in asymptomatic populations, Dr. Ken·Herrmann of the University Hospital Essen in Germany clearly stated that it is too early to promote fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG-PET)-based cancer screening in the general population. It is understood that a related study in South Korea showed that about three-quarters of suspicious PET results were ultimately confirmed to be false positives. Experts suggest that a “tiered screening” strategy should be adopted in the future, first using low-cost blood or saliva biomarkers for filtering, and then using PET imaging for high-risk populations.

In the areas of cardiovascular disease prevention and Alzheimer's disease diagnosis, experts demonstrated new application scenarios for nuclear medicine technology. Dr. Markus·Hacker of the Medical University of Vienna proposed using FDG-PET to directly assess arterial wall inflammation, in order to overcome the limitations of risk prediction based on traditional blood pressure and cholesterol indicators; Dr. Massimo·Filippi of the San Raffaele Scientific Institute suggested combining plasma phosphorylated tau 217 blood testing to guide PET scans for evaluating amyloid burden and treatment response to antibody drugs.

Although the application prospects of nuclear technology are broad, participating experts expressed a cautious attitude toward the overdiagnosis, false positives, and burden on medical resources caused by blind expansion of screening. Professor Erba emphasized that the nuclear medicine community should not only focus on whether diseases can be detected early, but must also prove through long-term prospective studies that preventive measures can truly improve patient prognosis and overall health status.