2017 updates: What you need to know
The Standards and Guidelines for Nuclear/PET Accreditation are instrumental in effecting the quality of patient care that the Intersocietal Accreditation Commission (IAC) is committed to maintaining. As an accreditation organization, they work hard to ensure their program strikes a balance between the changing needs of the medical community as well as the general public. Periodically, the IAC standards are reviewed by the Board of Directors and revised as necessary.
On September 15, 2016, the IAC released an updated version of the IAC Standards and Guidelines for Nuclear/PET Accreditation, which will become effective on March 15, 2017.
Key Revisions
While some of the revisions to the standards were made for purposes of clarification or explanation of previous standards, other requirements have been modified to reflect a change. The key modifications include:
- Technical Staff – The Standard previously titled nuclear medicine technologist(s) is now titled technical staff in all references.
- General Protocol Guidelines –The most significant change to the newly published Standards and Guidelines is the inclusion of administered dose ranges, which have been added to the Standards in an effort to reduce patient radiation exposure in myocardial perfusion imaging studies.
- Part D: Therapy Procedures – The majority of the new Part D section already existed in the previous Standards. In the updated version these requirements were moved to a new section for Therapy Protocols and Performance only.
For a summary of all the revisions made to the Nuclear/PET Standards, visit intersocietal.org/nuclear/standards/IACNuclearPETStandards2016_SummaryofChanges.pdf.