National intercomparison program for radiopharmaceutical activity measurements

Since 1998, the National Laboratory for Ionizing Radiation Metrology has lead an intercomparison program for activity measurements of radiopharmaceuticals administered to patients in the Nuclear Medicine Services (NMS) with the purpose of promoting the quality control. In this work, intercomparison results with the radionuclides 67Ga, 123I, 99mTc and 201Tl from the beginning of the program to the present will be presented establishing as a consequence, the radionuclide calibrators’ traceability used by the participants. The analysis of the results showed that 68% were within the limits of ±10% required by the Brazilian Regulatory Authority that demands this accuracy band for the radiopharmaceutical measurements in the NMS. The results also demonstrate an improvement in the measurement quality that this program has provided since its beginning.