Effective dose to staff members in a positron emission tomography/CT facility using zirconium-89

Positron emission tomography (PET) using zirconium-89 ((89)Zr) is complicated by its complex decay scheme. In this study, we quantified the effective dose from (89)Zr and compared it with fluorine-18 fludeoxyglucose ((18)F-FDG).

Effective dose distribution in a PET/CT facility in Riyadh was calculated by Monte Carlo simulations using MCNPX. The positron bremsstrahlung, the annihilation photons, the delayed gammas from (89)Zr and those emissions from (18)F-FDG were modelled in the simulations but low-energy characteristic X-rays were ignored.

On the basis of injected activity, the dose from (89)Zr was higher than that of (18)F-FDG. However, the dose per scan from (89)Zr became less than that from (18)F-FDG near the patient, owing to the difference in injected activities. In the corridor and control rooms, the (89)Zr dose was much higher than (18)F-FDG, owing to the difference in attenuation by the shielding materials.

The presence of the high-energy photons from (89)Zr-labelled immuno-PET radiopharmaceuticals causes a significantly higher effective dose than (18)F-FDG to the staff outside the patient room. Conversely, despite the low administered activity of (89)Zr, it gives rise to a comparable or even lower dose than (18)F-FDG to the staff near the patient. This interesting result raises apparently contradictory implications in the radiation protection considerations of a PET/CT facility.

To the best of our knowledge, radiation exposure to staff and public in the PET/CT unit using (89)Zr has not been investigated. The ultimate output of this study will lead to the optimal design of the facility for routine use of (89)Zr.