CCSNMMI 2013
              
Fall Newsletter 
Fall, 2014
 
In This Issue
WFNMBM Update
2014 CCSNMMI Road Shows
Sterility of Intravenous Catheterization Tubing
President-Elect Update
Technologist Award and Scholarships

World Federation of Nuclear Medicine and Biology Meeting 

 

 

Tina M. Buehner, MS, CNMT, RT(N)(CT)
 
President, CCSNMMI-TS 

 

This year I ended my summer with a very special trip.  I had the privilege of attending the 11th Congress World Nuclear Medicine and Biology meeting (WFNMB) which was held August 27 - 31st, 2014 in beautiful, sunny Cancun, Mexico.  The white-sand beaches and crystal blue waters make Cancun a very desirable location to hold any meeting.  The World Federation of Nuclear Medicine and Biology (WFNMB) is a rather special meeting because it is only held every 4 years.  In 2010 it was held in Cape Town, South Africa, and the next meeting in 2018 is to be held in Melbourne, Australia.  I am very happy to have had the chance to attend the meeting this year in Cancun, Mexico.  What made it so much more exciting for me was that I had the opportunity to see students that I have personally mentored present abstracts at this meeting.  This year the SNMMI granted 10 travel awards to students who had presented abstracts at this year's annual meeting in St. Louis, Missouri.  These grants allowed them the opportunity to travel to Cancun to present their abstracts there as well. 

 

I am pleased to announce that of the 10 students who received travel awards, 8 of them were from right here in the Central Chapter.  I think that says great things about the Nuclear Medicine Technology programs within our Chapter.  I had the pleasure of listening to some of  the presentations in Mexico and their hard work clearly showed in their abstracts.  I would like to recognize these individuals for the fantastic job they did.  Elizabeth Garay, Timothy Naegle, Nicholas Schertz, and Jack Younan, Allison Woodwick, Mariah Root, Lisa Fernholz, and Clarissa Venzke. Congratulations!!  Upon finishing their presentations, each student was gifted with a bottle of 

Tequila.  As they say "When in Rome......." 

 

2014 CCSNMMI  Road Shows  
"Back to Basics:  The Heart of Nuclear Medicine and Beyond"

The Central Chapter Continuing Education Committee, chaired by Christopher Jacobs, has scheduled a series of Road Shows in 2014 

 

This year's Road Shows will be held in Grand Rapids, Michigan, LaCrosse, Wisconsin, Naperville, Illinois, Indianapolis, Indiana and St. Paul, Minnesota.

 

The topics are:

  • Reading Between the Lines: EKG Interpretation
  • Patient Care 101
  • Quality Assurance and Accreditation
  • ALARA in The Era of Hybrid Imaging

The learning objectives are as follows: 

  • Review electrocardiogram interpretations
  • Discuss important considerations in patient care
  • Review the Quality Assurance and Accreditation process
  • Indentify methods of Imaging Gently and Imaging Wisely

Want to attend?  Just click on the location below:

 

Indianapolis, Indiana

COMPLETED

 

LaCrosse, Wisconsin

October 11, 2014

 

Naperville, Illinois

November 8, 2014

 

Grand Rapids, Michigan

November 8, 2014

 

Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN
October 18, 2014 
 

 

To view photos from past CCSNMMI events, click on the image below.

 
Contact Us

Central Chapter SNMMI
1240 Iroquois Avenue, Ste. 106
Naperville, Illinois 60563
Ph:  630/428-3877
Email:  info@ccsnm.org
Web Site:  www.ccsnm.org
Are you registered yet? 
2014 CCSNMMI Fall Education Symposium  

 

New and Improved Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging


October 18-19, 2014

Kalahari Resort and Convention Center

Sandusky, OH

Register NOW!  

 

The fields of nuclear medicine and molecular imaging are experiencing two kinds of progress-the "Wow!  That's really clever!" type enabled by major breakthroughs and truly novel ideas in technology and science, and the "It's about time something happened to that old standard" type, whereby a tried-and-true practice is gradually but inexorably replaced by something newer and, hopefully, better.  This concise day-and-a-half educational symposium offers examples of both types for technologists, physicians, scientists and  educators, covering selected advances in instrumentation, development of diagnostic and therapeutic      radiopharmaceuticals, the status of clinical trials, and best-practice updates.  We hope you enjoy our  intellectual smorgasbord!

 

Click here to  view or download the full registration brochure.   

 

Interested in exhibiting or sponsoring?  Click here to view/download the Exhibitor Information packet.  

Save the Date! 

2015 CCSNMMI Annual Spring Meeting
Nuclear Medicine 
A to Z

 

March 28-29, 2015

Doubletree Oak Brook
Oak Brook, IL

Topics to include:
MIBG /MUGA- Heart Failure
ICD-10: National Update
Molecular Breast Imaging
Cardiac SPECT/CT
plus MUCH MORE

Sterility of Intravenous Catheterization Tubing: Is it Safe to Remove the Sterile Cap for an Extended Period of Time?


 
Paige Nilles, CNMT

Many of our nuclear medicine exams require intravenous (IV) catheterization. In order to start an IV on a patient one must prepare the necessary supplies. Some technologists do this before bringing the patient back to the department in order to make the procedure run a little more smoothly. But what happens when the patient's blood sugar is too high, or they've had caffeine? This set up of supplies has to sit until the next patient arrives. In some departments that could be minutes - others it could be hours. This research shows if removing the sterile cap from the intravenous catheterization tubing (following the injection of a saline solution in order to prime the tube) affects the sterility of the tubing after being exposed to the environment of a nuclear medicine department for up to four hours before use.

 

A total of thirty intravenous catheterization tubes were primed with a saline solution, sterile cap removed, and set on an IV start tray at a local hospital in the nuclear medicine department. The tubes were left exposed to the environment for a total of four hours. The environment included the movement of patients and technologists walking by for various reasons. The end of the tubes where the sterile cap was removed were swabbed using a sterile nasal swab moistened with sterile water at time 0hr, 2hr, and 4hr and wiped on a sheep's blood agar plate. A different swab was used each time. After 48 hours of incubation at 37 degrees Celsius the samples were evaluated for pathogenic growth, non-pathogenic growth and no growth.

 

None of the samples had any pathogenic growth. 17 out of 90 (18%) samples had non-pathogenic growth; 73 had no growth. Growth was most frequently observed at 0mins.

 

Leaving the sterile cap off of the intravenous catheterization tubing (after injecting it with saline solution) for an extended period of time (four hours) led to no pathogenic growth. Since there was non-pathogenic growth on 17 of the agar plates, the possibility of pathogenic growth is still there.


2014 President-Elect Update 

 

 

KG Bennet, MD
 
President-Elect, CCSNMMI 

 

I can't believe it's fall already.  We have several great meetings planned, such as the Road Shows throughout the Central Chapter this Fall and our 2015 Spring Meeting to be held in Chicago (Oakbrook, IL) next March. Our upcoming Fall Meeting will be held at the Kalahari Waterpark in Sandusky, Ohio looks to be both fun and informative. Lisa Hazen has organized this and there will be talks on Lymphoseek, Xofigo, I-131, chemotherapy, clinical trials network and the future of advanced practice imagers.  We will have 12 credits and several SAM sessions available. In our upcoming meetings we will also discuss international, national and local issues affecting nuclear medicine.

 

The US dependence on globally produced Mo99/Tc99m may be coming to an end. Domestic production of Mo99/Tc99m has finally started.  NorthStar is proceeding with two independent methods for making Mo99/Tc99m generators from low enriched uranium (LEU). One is reactor based and will use the University Missouri Research Reactor, and the other involves a linear accelerator being constructed in Beloit, Wisconsin.  NorthStar hopes to provide most of our domestic supply within the next few years.  This is especially important as the Chalk River Plant in Canada is planning to stop production of Mo99 in 2015 and the National Nuclear Safety Administration (NNSA) is trying to eliminate the proliferation of Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU), especially for medical isotope production by 2016.  NNSA is concerned that Iran and North Korea will continue to use medical isotope production as an excuse to produce HEU or weapons grade uranium. Most of our current supply comes from aging reactors that are already operating past their original life expectancy.  Hopefully, having a domestic supply will also prevent shortages as these aging reactors experience more and more down time for maintenance. 

 

Several changes are happening on the national level. As we heard at the Spring Meeting, JCAHO will be requiring accreditation of hospital-based Nuclear Medicine Departments.  This was supposed to begin July 2014 but has been delayed to start July 2015.  The Proposed Rule for CY 2015 has more bundling of radiopharmaceuticals.  CMS has ruled on "Direct supervision" and removed the "direct" wording in regards to the preparation of radiopharmaceuticals by nuclear medicine technologists. This will allow Nuclear Medicine technologists to prepare doses after-hours without the physical presence of a physician or radiopharmacist.  The CCK shortage should soon be over since production of CCK has finally returned.


On a chapter level, we just revised our bylaws to reflect our name changing from CCSNM to CCNMMI.  As we went through the bylaws, we found some other ways to make them more current.  We proposed adding electronic voting and nominations, we changed the name of the Publications committee to the Communications committee, and we organized the committees so all of the committees have the same number of members and the same terms (with the exception of the finance committee because the Secretary Treasurer chairs this committee).  We also added provisional members to the committees to encourage more people to get involved with governance. We just revised and updated our Central Chapter website.  I invite you to check out our new website at CCSNMMI.ORG to take a look.  I am looking forward to serving as your next president and to the broad spectrum of challenges

Upcoming Technologist Awards and Scholarships Deadlines 

 

2015 PDEF Mickey Williams Technologist Minority Scholarship

Deadline:  November 30, 2014     Amount:  $2,500

 

2015 SNMMI-TS Advanced Practitioner Program Scholarship

Deadline:  November 30, 2014

Amount:  $5,000 

 

2015 SNMMI-TS Paul Cole Technologist Scholarship

Deadline:  December 31, 2014        

Amount:  ($1,000/Awardee OR $500/SEMATA Awardee)

 

2015 SNMMI-TS Bachelor's Degree Completion Scholarship

Opens:  October 1, 2014

Amount:  $4,000

 

2015 PDEF Professional Development Scholarship       Opens:  October 1, 2014

Amount:  $5,000

 

2015 SNMMI-TS Travel and Student Travel Awards

Opens:  October, 2014

Amount:  $1,000

 

View the complete listing of current and upcoming grants, awards, and scholarships.