Metrology for clinical implementation of dosimetry in molecular radiotherapy

The use of radiopharmaceuticals for treating cancer in Europe has grown considerably over the last few years. Current practice is to administer a carefully measured radioactivity dose to a patient, without taking into account the amount of radioactivity actually absorbed by tissue in the patient’s body. As a result, the administered dose is not the best indicator of effective treatment, and accurate knowledge of the radioactivity absorbed by tissue would make a significant difference to the success of many patients’ treatments. A recent EU Directive (2013/59/EURATOM) will require individual dose planning based on absorbed dose measurements for patients from February 2018. However, the planning process is complex and no standard methods exist to support clinics’ compliance with the regulation. This project addressed these obstacles by building on the work of previous EMRP project HLT11 MetroMRT, developing a robust measurement protocol and providing standardised methods, test objects and resources to support molecular radiotherapy clinics in setting up and validating dosimetry, thereby improving patient outcomes.