Successful Identification of Coexisting Renal Carcinoid and Giant Cell Arteritis with [ ⁶⁸ Ga]Ga-DOATATOC Positron Imaging

Giant cell arteritis (GCA), the most frequent large-vessel vasculitis, typically involves medium to large arteries and occasionally coexists with malignancy. We report a 69-year-old woman with renal carcinoid who developed concurrent tumour recurrence and GCA. Following progressive symptoms of headache and bone pain, [ 68 Ga]Ga-DOTA-Tyr3-octreotide ([ 68 Ga]Ga-DOTATOC) positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT) demonstrated multisite recurrent renal carcinoid, diffuse arterial and cardiac activity and heterogeneous [ 68 Ga]Ga-DOTATOC-avid thoracic aortic aneurysm. An elevated erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) of 87 mm/h confirmed active GCA. This case highlights the novel utility of [ 68 Ga]Ga-DOTATOC PET/CT as a dual-purpose biomarker for both tumour mapping and vascular inflammation in complex clinical presentations.