EANM Board Meeting on Education in Radiopharmacy

Minutes of the meeting Saturday 22 November 2003
EANM Secretariat, Hollandstrasse, Vienna , Austria


Present: Stephen Mather, United Kingdom; Ulderico Mazzi, Italy; Michael Eisenhut, Germany; Akli Hammadi, France; Gerrit Westera, Switzerland; J.M. Scherrmann, France; P.A. Schubiger, Switzerland; Tanja Gmeiner Stopar, Slovenia and as observers Gyözö Janoki Hungary and Mrs. Hafner-Furegati, Switzerland.

  1. Several courses on Radiopharmaceutical Chemistry and Radiopharmacy, covering the Curriculum accepted by the European community of radiopharmaceutical chemists and radiopharmacists as represented by the Committee on Radiopharmacy of the EANM were successfully organised during the last years in Frankfurt and Ljubljana (Block 1, Radiopharmacy), Saclay and Zürich (Block 2, Radiopharmaceutical chemistry) , Leipzig and Saclay (Block 3, Related Subjects).
    It was considered diligent to lay the future of this education in the hands of the Board on Education.
    Steps have been undertaken to create a faculty of Radiopharmaceutical Chemistry and Radiopharmacy in the School of Nuclear Medicine; at the December Meeting of the Committee on Education it is hoped to bring this process a step further. The Board on Education in Radiopharmacy will constitute the faculty of this part of the school. The board will consist of one representative of each of the courses complemented by three independent members and (if that is agreeable with the members of the Medical Faculty in the School) one physician appointed by the Medical Faculty in exchange for a member of our Faculty who should join the board of the Medical Faculty. For the present time the existing board will serve, with the provision that Alphons Verbruggen (Leuven, Belgium) will replace Willem Vaalburg (Groningen, The Netherlands). Depending on the outcome of the meeting of the Committee on Education in December, the board will be newly constituted along the rules outlined above at the next board meeting 8. May 2004. Distance learning should have a place in future considerations also.
  2. From the practical part of the curriculum, radio immuno assay was removed. Those who still perform IA's will be able to find ways of education, but it is not anymore a widespread practice in Nuclear Medicine.
  3. Evaluation of the courses is necessary to exclude possible overlap, to see if themes of importance are missing, to identify superfluous material and to improve bad lectures.
    Evaluation of the courses has been done mainly by questioning the students. This will be coordinated so as to assure that the questioning in all courses is equivalent; the course organisers will contact each other and compare and contact former students.
    To ensure quality, equivalence and compliance with the syllabus of the courses Stephen Mather will check Block 1, Michael Eisenhut Block 2 and Ulderico Mazzi Block 3.
  4. The certificate will be formulated in such a way so as to state that the students have reached a level of knowledge necessary to run radiopharmacies in Nuclear Medicine Departments (either "classical" or PET). The ESNM will not issue certificates anymore. For the time being, the chairman of the Board will sign the certificates.
  5. To evaluate the application of Students for certification the student has to approach the Chairman of the board, who will deal her / him a board member who will do the actual evaluation. For the theoretical part the criterion will be the passing of the final exams of the three blocks. Students with notorious previous knowledge possibly exceeding the course contents may be allowed to attend only part of the courses, but to get the certificate the exam('s) have to be done and passed.
    Diploma's (the certificate is postgraduate, the students must have a university diploma at least at the masters level) have to be checked (national delegates will be appointed who may be able to help to judge the diploma's).
    For the practical part the required time of experience is changed to two years. To judge if the practical experience gained in that time covers the syllabus, a check list will be provided (Gerrit Westera will make it), where the points will have to be signed off by the supervisor. The board member collecting the material of a student should use his judgement about the adequacy of the institutions where the experience was gained. Where large deficits are apparent, the board member must advise and help the student to gather some experience at another institution.
  6. Coordination of the courses:
    • The ETH Postgraduate Diploma courses are examined together after all three courses have been completed. Schubiger will look into the possibility to have an exam after each course.
    • The ETH Postgraduate Diploma courses have been held every two years, the INSTN courses every year. It was agreed that in the future there should be one series of courses every year, INSTN + Ljubljana alternating with ETH. French regulations have to be changed to make this possible. J.M. Scherrmann will work on this. It was pointed out that it might be a good thing if the French would accept the other courses (Zürich, Leipzig, French students are only pharmacists). For now the INSTN will limit the number of foreign students to the minimum necessary for the course.
    • Next courses: INSTN Block 2 resp. 3, November 2003 resp. March 2004. Ljubljana Block 1, September 2004. ETH, Block 3 (Leipzig), March 2004.
    • Fees of at least 1000 Euro will be charged to the students. Students who can not afford the cost of attending, may go after bursaries of the IAEA, the EANM Marie Curie Fund (see www.eanm.org) or the student help provided by the International Society of Radiopharmaceutical Chemistry and Biology. The suggestions for help will appear on the website of the EANM.
  7. As a further strategy governments of the European countries will have to be convinced, that the appropriate education for people to run a radiopharmacy is the EANM certified postgraduate education. To achieve that national delegates wil be appointed and asked to approach their governments on this matter. The national EANM delegates will serve all the courses and replace the INSTN national coordinators. This will be discussed in the afternoon meeting.
  8. Draft guidelines for radiopharmacies (both classical and PET) have appeared in the blue pages of the EJNM and on the radiopharmacy pages of the EANM website. They will point out the necessity of appropriately schooled personnel. They will also be discussed by the delegates in the afternoon meeting.

The next board meeting will be 8. May 2004, same place 10.00-14.00.