Radionuclide calibrators and nuclear medicine

Radionuclide calibrators are required in nuclear medicine to ensure the quality of measurement of administered radionuclide activity. However survey results of radionuclide calibrator assay comparisons performed in several countries have shown that for many routine calibrator measurements, the errors exceeded the accuracy quoted by the manufacturers. A new NPL secondary standard radionuclide calibrator '271 and 671' is described which provides reliable measurements of activity which are traceable to national standards. (U.K.)