Author: Steven Brown, Mike Hopkins, Jerimy C. Polf, Scott Sawyer, Benjamin L. Viglianti 👨🔬
Affiliation: H3D, inc, University of Michigan, M3D, Inc, M3D Imaging 🌍
Purpose: To evaluate the potential of a radiation imaging survey meter (RISM) to improve detection and efficiency/speed for radiopharmaceutical therapy (RPT) suite clean up after patient treatment has been completed.
Methods: We used the RISM and a pancake Gieger-Meuller (GM) counter to identify three hidden locations of deliberate 99mTc contamination in a patient waiting room. We recorded the time needed for eight technicians (blinded to the locations) to identify each contamination location with the GM and for the RISM to form an image that identifies the location of the contamination. Additionally, we tested the sensitivity of RISM to locate contamination, identify isotope and clean Lu-177 and I-131 (MIBG) treatment rooms/bathrooms and compared the time required to locate and clean the rooms with a GM counter.
Results: The location and isotope (99mTC) of all contamination sources in the patient waiting room were identified by the technicians with a GM in an average time (SD) of 134 (43) seconds, while the RISM image identified all source locations with an average of 48 (14) seconds. The RISM was able to identify and image Lu-177 contamination within a patient treatment room and within a patient bathroom where the GM was overwhelmed by the contamination. The time needed to identify and clean up the Lu-177 treatment room and bathrooms with the RISM was on average ~10 minutes, while the average time required using a GM was ~30 minutes. For the MIBG treatment suite, clean up time with the RISM was ~2 hours and ~4 hours with a GM to identify, clean and verify all contamination was removed.
Conclusion: The RISM reduced the time needed by technicians to identify the presence of contamination compared to standard pancake GM method, as well as allowed identification of the isotope type in the contamination.