Assessment and Registration of Effective Doses Used in Diagnostic Nuclear Medicine Examinations

Abstract

Over the recent period, the Russian healthcare system has been undertaking a nation-wide renewal of equipment for nuclear medicine, which, in turn, opens a gate to new diagnostic radiopharmaceuticals (DRPs) to routine practice. The market welcomed a new class of targeted DRPs. Dozens of PET centres and diagnostic rooms where DRPs with ultrashort-lived radionuclides are used for medical examination have been put into operation. All this dictates the need to modify the existing guidelines that govern this area. In 2021, there was an update in the procedural guidelines (PGs) MU 2.6.1.3700-21 “Assessment and registration of effective doses used in diagnostic nuclear medicine examinations”. The document presented the dose coefficients for new DRPs based on the latest data from the International Commission on Radiological Protection and the literature. This included calculation of the effective doses (using tissue weighting factors) from 1 MBq of radioactivity for approximately 280 DRPs used across five different age groups, as per ICRP Publication 60. These PGs apply to diagnostic nuclear medicine examinations performed using DRPs, scintigraphy, single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) and positron emission tomography (PET) alone or in combination with X-ray computed tomography (SPECT/CT; PET/CT). The guidelines do not apply to radionuclide therapies that involve DRP administration that require individual planning and assessment of the absorbed doses across the target regions, critical organs and other radiosensitive organs and tissues.