Traceability in nuclear medicine

Accurate, reproducible measurement of radioactivity in nuclear medicine applications is vital to ensure the safety and effectiveness of disease diagnosis and treatment using unsealed radioactive sources. The need to maintain a high degree of confidence in those measurements requires that they be carried out so as to be traceable to national and international standards. In addition, measurement traceability for radioactivity in medicine helps ensure international consistency in measurement at all levels of practice (national measurement laboratories, research institutions, isotope producers, radiopharmaceutical manufacturers and clinics). This paper explores the importance of radioactivity measurement in nuclear medicine and demonstrates how traceability can be extended from international standards to the quantity of the drug administered to the patient.