@article {Dannoon263, author = {Shorouk F. Dannoon and Saud Alenezi and Naheel Alnafisi and Samar Almutairi and Fatma Dashti and Medhat M. Osman and Abdelhamid Elgazzar}, title = {Reducing Radiation Exposure from PET Patients}, volume = {50}, number = {3}, pages = {263--268}, year = {2022}, doi = {10.2967/jnmt.121.263223}, publisher = {Society of Nuclear Medicine}, abstract = {This study measured the typical emitted radiation rate from the urinary bladder of PET patients after their scan and investigated simple methods for reducing the emitted radiation before discharge. Methods: The study included 83 patients (63 18F-FDG and 20 18F-NaF patients). Emitted radiation from the patients{\textquoteright} urinary bladder was measured with an ionization survey meter at a 1-m distance, presuming the urinary bladder to be the primary source of radiation. The measurements were taken at different time points after PET image acquisition: immediate (prevoid 1), voided (postvoid 1), after waiting 30 min in the uptake room while drinking 500 mL of water (prevoid 2), and voided again (postvoid 2). Results: For 18F-FDG patients, the reduction of emitted radiation due to drinking water and voiding alone from prevoid 1 to decay-corrected postvoid 2 was an average of 22.49\% {\textpm} 7.48\% (13.65 {\textpm} 3.42 μSv/h to 10.48 {\textpm} 2.37 μSv/h, P \< 0.001). For 18F-NaF patients, the reduction was an average of 25.80\% {\textpm} 10.03\% (9.83 {\textpm} 2.01 μSv/h to 7.23 {\textpm} 1.49 μSv/h, P \< 0.001). Conclusion: In addition to the physical decay of the radiotracers, using the biologic clearance properties resulted in a significant decrease of the emitted radiation in this study. Implementing additional water consumption to facilitate voiding with 30 min of wait time before discharging certain 18F-FDG and 18F-NaF patients who need to be in close contact with others, such as elderly, caregivers, and inpatients, might facilitate lowering their emitted radiation by an average of 22\%{\textendash}25\% due to voiding, not counting in the physical decay that should add an additional 17\% reduction.}, issn = {0091-4916}, URL = {https://tech.snmjournals.org/content/50/3/263}, eprint = {https://tech.snmjournals.org/content/50/3/263.full.pdf}, journal = {Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology} }