Radiopharmaceuticals perspectives of the development

Posted by: @marie-curie

Hi all! Radiopharmaceuticals, like all nuclear medicine, represent, as it seems to me, a unique branch of medicine? it allows diagnosing a number of diseases at very early stages and conducting therapy, for example, in oncology, with significantly less damage to the body. However, radiopharmaceuticals are not used as often as we would like. What do you think about this? What are the perspectives for the development of this direction in your opinion?

I think, nevertheless, perhaps they are not always applicable for the diagnosis, for example, of infectious diseases.

In general, most radiopharmaceuticals have a short half-life period. It can range from a few seconds to several days or a month. Therefore, they are made on the spot in a special laboratory, the quality is immediately analyzed, and then they are given to the patient. Due to the short life of radiopharmaceutical drugs they cannot be transported far away, cannot be stored and accumulated for future use.

Hi! I fully agree that radiopharmaceuticals are absolutely unique. Meanwhile, it seems to me that it is rather difficult to work with it from a purely technical point of view. They are almost impossible to transport (what @aleksandr-ialkaev wrote about above) and store, because of this it is necessary to build specialized laboratories in the immediate vicinity of medical centers. In addition, diagnostics using radiopharmaceuticals requires expensive equipment (PET and SPECT, for example); not all medical centers can afford it. I believe that states and people will invest in the development of this branch of medicine, because it literally opens up new opportunities, and sooner or later radiopharmaceuticals will become available to a wide range of patients.

it's also worth adding, perhaps, radiophobia, from which suffers a significant part of people. Some of them are simply afraid of radiopharmaceuticals

@aleksandr-ialkaev what happens to radiopharmaceuticals during storage?

During storage radiopharmaceuticals decompose into daughter radionuclides. The half-life indicates the time it takes for half of the original atoms of the radiopharmaceutical to decomposite.

The expiration date of the radiopharmaceutical must be such that its residual radioactivity is sufficient to provide a therapeutic effect or for diagnostics. The expiration date is indicated in the pharmacopoeia or in the specification. If the storage time exceeds the expiration date of the radiopharmaceutical, then its radioactivity decreases and it no longer meets the requirements of the pharmacopoeia or specification.

@aleksandr-ialkaev ok, thanks!