Practical Tools for Patient-specific Characterization and Dosimetry of Radiopharmaceutical Extravasation.

Area of Science:

• Nuclear Medicine
• Medical Physics
• Radiopharmaceutical Therapy

Background:

• Extravasation, occurring in over 10% of radiopharmaceutical injections, leads to unintended radiation doses in tissues.
• Standardized analysis of extravasations is crucial for accurate dosimetry but is hindered by a lack of accessible tools.

Purpose of the Study:

• To enhance existing methods for characterizing and performing dosimetry on radiopharmaceutical extravasations.
• To develop and validate user-friendly tools for standardized, practical dosimetric analysis in clinical settings.

Main Methods:

• Utilized Monte Carlo simulations to compute dosimetric values for sixteen common nuclear medicine isotopes.
• Validated simulation data against five alternative dose assessment methods.
• Developed and assessed three novel characterization tools: a worksheet, a spreadsheet, and a web application.

Main Results:

• Achieved an average variation of 3.1% between simulation results and alternative dose assessment methods.
• Demonstrated an average error of 7.9% when recalculating published dosimetry results.
• Characterization tools required 1-5 minutes for use, showing favorable agreement across all three methods.

Conclusions:

• Developed improved, free, and publicly available tools for the characterization and dosimetry of radiopharmaceutical extravasation.
• These tools facilitate standardized routine clinical analysis, enhancing patient care, follow-up, documentation, and event reporting.