A study demonstrating whether the percentage of residual activity post ¹⁸F-FDG admininstration can be predicted for technologists with varying years of experience.

Objectives The Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging (SNMMI) and European Association of Nuclear Medicine (EANM) recommend that Positron Emission Tomography - Computed Tomography (PET/CT) technologists record the exact amount of activity administered to their patients. A prospective study was conducted to see how the percentage of activity remaining in the syringe post 2-deoxy-2-[¹⁸F]-fluoro-D-glucose (FDG) administration varied for technologists with varying years of experience in PET/CT.

Methods Syringes containing patient doses of FDG were assayed prior to administration and re-assayed after administration by a technologist with greater than ten years of experience, a technologist with less than ten years of experience, and a student technologist with zero years of experience. Data was collected from thirty syringes per subject (for a total of ninety syringes) over a two-month period. Differences and percentages were calculated using the decay-corrected true residual activity and the standard residual activity (11.1MBq(0.3mCi)) used by the technologists in the PET/CT department at an urban university hospital. For each subject, the true residual activity and the standard residual activity were compared via t-tests. An ANOVA test (p<0.05 was considered significant) was conducted to ascertain whether or not there was significant variance between the three subjects.

Results The p-values for the most experienced technologist (p>0.05) do not demonstrate a significant difference between the true residual activity in the syringe and standard residual activity, whereas the p-values for the less experienced technologists (p<0.05) do demonstrate a significant difference between the true and standard residual activities.

Conclusions The residual activity for the technologist with the most years of experience is predictable but not for the technologist with less experience and the student technologist with zero years experience. An overall standard residual activity cannot be used for all technologists.