A computerized system for control and management of radionuclide inventory: application in nuclear medicine

An interactive computerized system for radioisotope management and instantaneous inventory is reported. The system is capable of handling operations such as filing, nuclear imaging and disposing of various radionuclides. All radiopharmaceutical transactions are achieved with the aid of a Prime 300 mini-computer of 192K words of high speed semi-conductor memory and over 120 mega bytes of disk storage. The system automatically corrects for the appropriate decay, monitors and updates the storage file after every subsequent study. The performed study is recorded in a special file, together with the time and data retrieved from the computer's real time clock at the time of the entry. The system provides an organized and complete bookkeeping of all records concerning radionuclide transactions. It is found to be simple, efficient, highly versatile, and drastically reduces the time of operation and errors in handling the radioisotope inventory.