This is not uncommon -- in fact, at Hopkins the radiologist specifically noted that some activity in my husband's right lung, seen on his 3-month PET/CT, was due to residual inflammation from an aspiration pneumonia he had right at the end of treatment. The radiologist there is an expert in head/neck and brain PET/CTS, sees 100s of them, and says he is "pretty good" at eliminating false positives due to infection, inflammation or healing. Whereas a radiologist who only sees a few HNC PETs a year will be more cautious.

Anyway, Barry's RO had him have a chest xray as a baseline and then prescribed a course of antibiotics to clear up this lingering infection. A follow-up xray in a month showed no problem anymore, nor did his 6-month PET/CT.

Although mets to lungs do occur, the chance of this being an infection is pretty high. You may wish to ask about antibiotic course and follow-up xray as a first step...

Gail