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PET Pharmaceuticals

Non-FDG PET Radiopharmaceuticals
With 10 years of experience and unparalleled expertise, we are now the leading manufacturer of FDG and non-FDG radiopharmaceuticals in Hong Kong. We are determined to maintain a strong lead in this area with cutting-edge technologies.

Is FDG PET scan equivalent to PET scan?
FDG is the most commonly used radiopharmaceutical in PET applications because:

• By monitoring glucose metabolism, useful clinical information is obtained for oncology, neurology and cardiology cases.
• It is easy to produce FDG in large quantities (in Ci scale) with any automatic FDG synthesizer in a cyclotron site. The FDG can be either self consumed or dispensed to other PET centres.
• Its half-life is reasonably long (110 minutes), which makes it suitable for delivery to other PET centres.

Normally, physicians may recommend a FDG PET scan to patients. Based upon the results of the FDG images, patients may need to undergo a non-FDG PET scanning provided that it is available in the centre.

Why do we need PET radiopharmaceuticals other than FDG?
In regards to non-FDG avid diseases like liver cancer (HCC), kidney cancer (RCC), brain tumor, etc., other non-FDG radiopharmaceuticals have been proven effective at providing incremental values to their clinical diagnosis.

Liver Cancer (HCC)	Kidney Cancer (RCC)	Brain Tumor

Is it difficult to produce non-FDG radiopharmaceuticals in a PET/CT centre with cyclotron?
Besides a cyclotron, other components like expertise in biochemical design, sophisticated radiopharmaceutical synthesizers and other peripheral but essential supporting devices are crucial to developing different PET-imaging compounds. Though it may look simple on the paper, by considering the huge investments in all the necessary expertise and technologies, we are almost unique in having such a high diversity among most PET centres worldwide.



What non-FDG radiopharmaceuticals are alse offered to patients at the hospital?

[11C] PET Radiopharmaceutical	Clinical Applications
1. 11C-acetate	Hepatocellular Carcinoma 1 | 2, Renal cell Carcinoma Urological Carcinoma
2. 11C-choline	Brain tumor, Prostate Carcinoma
3. 11C-methionine	Parathyroid, Lymphoma, Neuroblastoma
4. 11C-PIB (2-(4-N-11C-methylaminophenyl)-      6-hydroxybenzothiazole)	Alzheimer's Disease
5. 11C-raclopride	Parkinsonism
6. 11C-palmitate	Myocardial Viability
7. 11C-O-methyl-L-tyrosine	Research for monitoring Breast Cancer Chemotherapy

[18F] PET Radiopharmaceutical	Clinical Applications
1. 18F-fluoroDOPA	Neuroendocrine Tumours and Parkinsonism
2. 18F-fluoride	Bone Metastasis
3. 18F-FES (18F-fluoroestradiol)	Breast Cancer Imaging
4. 18F-FLT (3'deoxy-3'-18F-fluorothymidine)	Monitoring Cell Proliferation
5. 18F-FMISO (18F-fluoromisonidazole)	Hypoxia Imaging
6. 18F-fluoromethylcholine	Brain Tumour and Prostate Carcinoma

[13N] PET Radiopharmaceutical	Clinical Applications
13N-ammonia	Myocardial perfusion

What other preparations are required to undergo a non-FDG scan?
Please refer to the Preparation Menu.