@burdyblue, not knowing is the hardest part of being a cancer survivor. Try not to let your imagination run away with you. After 7 years, my policy is that if my doctors do not definitively tell me that I have cancer, then I'm still cancer-free. I've had 2 times where my doctor saw something suspicious that turned out to be benign.

The only thing a PET scan will tell you is if the area is absorbing sugar. The body absorbs sugar locally for only three reasons: inflammation, infection, and metastasis. Except for the brain, which is using sugar all the time, which is why they don't bother doing a PET scan of the brain. So, in answer to your first question, no, a PET scan will not tell you what type of cancer. But it WILL tell you whether the nodule warrants further investigation. If they see a "lot" of sugar being absorbed, they'll investigate further, which could be a biopsy.

Your primary doctor is right. Your next step is to talk to a pulmonologist. If your primary did not give you a referral, ask her to. Try to hold on to the fact that, at the moment, you don't have cancer!

Full disclosure: I am a doctor, but not a medical doctor. I can only share my and others' experiences, what my doctors have told me in my last 7 years of having lung cancer, and what I'm learning as a patient research advocate.

Good luck, and let us know what you learn.