Simplification of Low Level Internal Dosimetry (SOLLID)
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Simplification of Low Level Internal Dosimetry
IRAS ID
219139
Contact name
Glenn Flux
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 11 months, 28 days
Research summary
Research Summary:
A study to develop practical methods of accurate low radiation absorbed dose measurement in patients referred for nuclear medicine scans.There is currently very little information on and therefore understanding of the effects of exposure to low levels of radiation on patients or radiation workers. Assumptions are largely based on evidence from high radiation doses following nuclear incidents which may not be applicable to medical procedures. Underestimation of the radiation effects incurs greater risk to patients than is currently assumed, while overestimation can prevent more informative scans that would be obtained from higher administered activities. This research study answers an invitation from the Department of Health Policy research programme to improve our understanding of those low radiation dose risks. Over 600,000 patients have nuclear medicine scans in the UK each year, presenting an opportunity to accurately measure low radiation doses and follow up the effects on a large number of patients. This study will develop practical methods to measure accurately the radiation doses delivered to patients referred for nuclear medicine positron emission tomography (PET) and single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) scans.
Five patients referred for each of 7 diagnostic nuclear medicine procedures will undergo up to 7 quantitative PET/SPECT scans and up to 10 whole body radiation retention measurements over the course of 1-2 days to enable their absorbed radiation doses to be calculated accurately. Analysis of subsets of these measurements will be performed to identify the timing and minimum number of measurements necessary for accurate dose estimates.
The longer term aim is that these methods and results will subsequently be used to inform a national epidemiological (epidemiology is the study of factors affecting the health and illness of populations) study on the effects of low doses of radiation.Summary of results:
This was a prospective non-interventional pilot study with additional non-interventional data analysis performed retrospectively on previously acquired clinical datasets. Prospectively up to 35 patients were to be imaged from the following diagnostic procedures: 99mTc-MDP/HDP Bone Imaging, 99mTc-MAG-3 renogram, 99mTc- DMSA renal imaging, 99mTc- pertechnetate thyroid Imaging, 18F-FDG, 68Ga PSMA prostate cancer imaging and 68Ga DOTATATE somatostatin receptor positive neuroendocrine tumour imaging.
The maximum amount of data that could practically be acquired at this site would be obtained, and used to determine the pertinent minimum data that could be acquired to robustly measure absorbed doses in multicentre setting for the epidemiological study.REC name
South Central - Oxford B Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
18/SC/0020
Date of REC Opinion
15 Jan 2018
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion