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WEB-BASED CALCULATOR FOR COUNSELING PATIENTS ON POTENTIAL TRIGGERING OF HOMELAND-SECURITY
RADIATION DETECTORS.
Contributors:
Detector Measurements: Gary Garetano (2) , Matthew Monetti (3), Venkata
Lanka (1) ,
Calculations: Michael G. Stabin(4)
Web Programming: Jacob M. Puthiamadathil (5) , James Boyce (1), Yihua Ye (1),
Audrey McNeil (1)
(1) New Jersey
Medical School, Newark, NJ; (2)Hudson Regional Health Commission, Secaucus,
NJ ; (3) Environmental Measurements Laboratory, U.S. Department of Homeland
Security, New York, NY; (4) Radiology/Radiological Sciences, Vanderbilt University,
Nashville, TN; (5) New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, NJ
INTRODUCTION
Recent advisories by the Society of Nuclear Medicine ( http://interactive.snm.org/index.cfm?PageID=556&RPID=969)
and Nuclear Regulatory Agency ( http://interactive.snm.org/index.cfm?PageID=1110&RPID=556&FileID=3949)
have recommended providing patients, following diagnostic or therapeutic procedures,
with a verifiable letter stating that the patients have received a radiopharmaceutical
for medical use. This will be of use to security officials in the event that
the patient trips a radiation sensor, such as those that have been distributed
to Homeland Security Officials.
The question that has not been addressed in these recommendations is how long
patients could conceivably trigger these alarms, and consequently, for how
long need they carry these documentation letters.
We have recently approached this problem by analyzing sensitivity of detectors
to medical radionuclides and applying this information to pharmacokinetic models
of radiopharmaceutical excretion. This information was presented at RSNA 2004
(Abstract http://rsna2004.rsna.org/rsna2004/V2004/conference/event_display.cfm?em_id=4407767
Press release
http://www.rsna.org/publications/rsnanews/dec04/radiation-1.html )
We have expanded this project by providing a JAVA based calculator on the
WWW. Advantages of this calculator are that additional flexibility is provided
(user can input dose, distance and thyroid uptake) and that the calculations
are widely available to anyone with WWW access. An abstract presenting this
calculator is approved for oral presentation at the 2005 Society of Nuclear
Medicine Meeting, Toronto Ontario , Jun 20 th , 5:42 PM (see http://interactive.snm.org/index.cfm?PageID=3902&RPID=3902&A=11&B=103&E=8&S=3&PID=21413 http://interactive.snm.org/index.cfm?PageID=3902&RPID=3902&A=11&B=103&E=8&S=3&PID=21413 )
Please note that the calculator assumes a normal rate of radiopharmaceutical
metabolism and excretion. Sensitivity for each radionuclide is based on the
most sensitive of the 4 models of detectors studied.
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