TY - JOUR T1 - Reducing Radiation Exposure from PET Patients JF - Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology JO - J. Nucl. Med. Technol. SP - 263 LP - 268 DO - 10.2967/jnmt.121.263223 VL - 50 IS - 3 AU - Shorouk F. Dannoon AU - Saud Alenezi AU - Naheel Alnafisi AU - Samar Almutairi AU - Fatma Dashti AU - Medhat M. Osman AU - Abdelhamid Elgazzar Y1 - 2022/09/01 UR - http://tech.snmjournals.org/content/50/3/263.abstract N2 - 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’ 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% ± 7.48% (13.65 ± 3.42 μSv/h to 10.48 ± 2.37 μSv/h, P < 0.001). For 18F-NaF patients, the reduction was an average of 25.80% ± 10.03% (9.83 ± 2.01 μSv/h to 7.23 ± 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%–25% due to voiding, not counting in the physical decay that should add an additional 17% reduction. ER -