A Proposed Simple Model for Estimating Occupational Radiation Dose to Staff from Veterinary 18F-FDG Pet Procedures

Abstract

Several studies have been conducted concerning the radiation dose to hospital personnel from positron emission tomography (PET) radiopharmaceuticals, but to date only one parallel study has been conducted for veterinary staff. Veterinary patients present challenges not encountered with human patients, as they require anesthesia and therefore more intensive monitoring than human patients. This paper presents a simple model for estimating the effective radiation dose to veterinary staff using occupational dose data from PET studies at Colorado State University's (CSU) James L. Voss Veterinary Teaching Hospital. The model consists of three point sources within a soft tissue cylinder, and sample calculations are provided for estimating dose to nuclear medicine technologists and an anesthesia technologist based on four different sized dogs. The estimated doses are within the range of actual occupational doses published previously. There are different protocols for the sequence of events in veterinary PET, specifically the order of anesthesia induction and radiopharmaceutical injection. When F-FDG injection is performed prior to anesthesia induction, the estimated dose is between 1.5 and 3.6 times higher than the doses received if injection is done after anesthesia induction, although expected doses for both protocols are below occupational dose limits based on a case load of 100 veterinary patients per year. The model is based on the techniques used at CSU, but it can be modified for different hospitals as well as differently sized animals.

External Exposure of Veterinary Staffs and Pet Owners from Feline ^99mTc-MAG3 Renal Scintigraphy

“…Some studies concern the radiation exposure from nuclear medicine procedure to the veterinary staff. [1][2][3][10][11][12][13] There is no report on the dose rate concerning feline scintigraphy. Our results of the exposure rates measured from personnel-patient interaction with various locations (Fig.…”

“…There are few data available about the radiation exposure from the radioactive small animal patient. [1][2][3] Veterinary staffs are frequently obtained to external radiation while performing nuclear medicine procedures such as preparing and administrating radiopharmaceuticals, restraining animal patient on the gamma-camera scanning table, removing the animal patient from the bed, and transporting and recovering post-sedated or anesthetized radioactive animal patient.…”

External Exposure to Veterinary Staff and Pet Owners from ¹⁸F-fluorodeoxyglucose (¹⁸F-FDG) Positron Emission Tomography

“…1,[5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] There is no standard 18 F-FDG PET/CT protocol for veterinary hospitals, and there are few studies on staff dose data for PET imaging. 16,17) Martinez et al 16) reported that the whole-body doses per scan in veterinary staff were higher than those of the medical staff because of the need for general anesthesia in animal patients to minimize movement and physically active muscle uptake, making the veterinary staff closer to patients than the medical staff.…”

“…However, some studies reported inducing general anesthesia and placing the patient on the PET scanner bed, and then injecting the radiotracer. [24][25][26][27][28] Martinez et al 17) reported that the estimated radiation dose during a PET/CT scan when 18 F-FDG injection was performed before anesthesia induction was higher than the 18 Japanese legislation restricts the 24 h detention period of radioactive animal patients when administering FDG radiopharmaceuticals. Thus, steps of the 18 F-FDG PET imaging protocol, evaluation of the external radiation exposure for veterinary staff in Japan under the applied SPECT system, necessity of the 24 h detention period of animal patients in hospitals, and risk assessment of owners are discussed in this study to increase familiarity and confidence in the PET fields of veterinary staff.…”

Exposure Doses to Technologists Working in 7 PET/CT Departments

“… 1 , 2 Given this rise, PET technologists have become increasingly exposed to radiation, which increases their overall occupational radiation exposure. Some past work has explored the radiation dose received by technologists in a single PET/computed tomography (CT) department 3 , 4 ; however, there has been a lack of research exploring the level received by technologists in larger regions of China. Here, our participants were all PET/CT staff across 7 departments in Shandong, China.…”