ABSTRACT

Radionuclide therapy or molecular radiotherapy may be defined as a radiation therapy. The aim of this therapy is to achieve a transfer of radiation energy to a pathological target tissue with locally or generally administered radionuclides and by this way to destruct the tissue. In this respect, unlike the external radiotherapy, as the target tissue is irradiated, there would be a minimal damage to the surrounding tissue. The estimation of the amount of absorbed radiation in the target tissue is the principal issue. As a result of the rapid development of the radionuclide treatment techniques, patient-based dosimetry concept has become an important issue for the point of the patient’s radiation safety. In this respect, radionuclide therapy dosimetry may be considered as an inherent part of radionuclide therapy in principle, as in external beam radiation therapy. In this review, dosimetric techniques, the effect on dose-response relationship, and results of previously developed dosimetry methods in thyroid carcinoma, neuroblastoma, neuro-endocrine tumours, as well as primary and metastatic liver tumours are discussed.