The Group held its most recent meeting at Kings College London and items of general interest are given below.
European Symposium on Radiopharmacy and Radiopharmaceuticals. This biennial meeting took place in Granada in May 2001 and a report, prepared by the recipients of the Group's travel awards is attached. It is hoped to have the next meeting in 2003 but the venue has yet to be decided.
Availability of Hespan. Following the recent difficulties in obtaining supplies of a suitable formulation, it is hoped that the problem has been resolved. Ampoules of the original Hespan should be available from Torbay by the end of July. On a wider basis, rationalisation of units producing "specials" is under consideration. The group is monitoring the situation to ensure the continued availability of products required in radiopharmacy.
Availability of Intrinsic factor. Following the withdrawal of Dicopac, an alternative supply of intrinsic factor of porcine origin is available from Boots Contract Manufacturing. It is unlicensed and data on origin and content are not at present very detailed. Capsules can be ordered in any quantity required. Information has now been received from the Department of Clinical Chemistry at Aarhus University Hospital Denmark who have various recombinant intrinsic factors which they are anxious to test. If interested, the information can be forwarded to you by e-mail.
Licensed MAA. In addition to Pulmocis, Lyo MAA from Mallinckrodt is now available as a licensed product for lung perfusion imaging.
Quality Assurance of Radiopharmaceuticals. The revision of this document has been completed and published in Nuclear Medicine Communications (2001) 22 909 -916. The more wider ranging publication Quality Assurance of Aseptic Preparation Services has also been revised and now runs to 183 pages. It includes all the latest revisions from GMP etc. It is to be published by the Pharmaceutical Press. On a similar topic, discussion has been taking place on the necessary background environment used for open radiopharmaceutical procedures --which are most likely to be blood labelling procedures. The MCA view is that blood labelling does not fall within their remit and the possible requirement for a Grade B background environment does not arise.
Training / education. You may have seen that the Thames radiopharmacy group was revived and recently held a meeting which was attended by approximately 20 people. One of the perceived values to participants was the ability to talk to other colleagues and exchange views and ideas to counteract possible feelings of working in isolation. Further meetings are planned and will be open to all departments across the country. The possibility of developing CPD via the College of Pharmacy Practice Faculty system is being pursued. Whereas radiopharmacy alone is probably too small to achieve faculty status, it may be possible to have a "chapter" within a Faculty of technical Pharmacists. The Postgraduate Teaching Course at Kings College London in April was attended by 23 students. Eleven of them took the exam at the end of the course and those who passed received a certificate. It is intended that this course will run again next April (15th - 19th) when it will also form the basis of Module 5030 of the Leeds University PTQA course.
Transport of radioactive materials by road. Changes to the regulations came into effect on July 1st which have implications for departments involved in this function. Changes are based on the IAEA document "Regulations for safe transport of radioactive material" (ST-1) and also include certain other provisions. There was a very short consultation period on the proposals in April / May which by passed many people. Changes include a new UN number for exempted packages and changes in the levels permitted in excepted packages. For background information see www.dtlr.gov.uk Look under Consultations, then Archive Papers.
Annual radiopharmacy Workshop - Bournville January 2002. Planning is under way for the next workshop in this popular series. Details will be available shortly, but you can make a note of the date - January 18th - in your diary now.
REVIEW OF THE 10TH EUROPEAN SYMPOSIUM ON RADIOPHARMACY & RADIOPHARMACEUTICALS
Any other general comments, views, news can be sent to:
Stuart Hesslewood (s.r.hesslewood@aston.ac.uk)