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Imaging and Nuclear Medicine Support Services

(Medical Imaging & Medical Physics, MIMP)

The first point of contact for accessing MIMP support is your R&D Coordinator, who will liaise with the appropriate contacts to ensure coordinated delivery of support for your research.

The Directorate of Medical Imaging and Medical Physics provides state of the art imaging in support of both commercial and academic research. Our staff are experienced in advanced imaging techniques and provide a complete service from advice on appropriate modalities and investigations, radiation dose assessment and legislative compliance through to image analysis, high quality, comprehensive consultant-led reporting and data archiving.

The directorate has an established research infrastructure, supported by a dedicated research support team of healthcare professionals, which enables patients to progress through the imaging components of a research study in a streamlined way, and ensuring compliance with all necessary governance requirements. All staff undertake GCP training, relevant to their role.

Our imaging facilities include:

• Multi-slice CT (combination of 64, 32 and 16 slice)
• MRI (1.5T and access to 3T through our partnership with the University of Sheffield, see below)
• Gamma cameras (with state of the art SPECT-CT (single photon emission computed tomography))
• Ultrasound
• Digital Radiography and Fluoroscopy
• Angiography
• Mammography
• Positron Emission Tomography (PET/CT) (provide through Independent Sector on-site service).

All of the directorate's images are archived on a modern Picture Archiving and Communications System (PACS), which is fully compliant with the requirements of the National Connecting for Health programme.

The directorate's Nuclear Medicine service provides a state of the art radiopharmacy, with facilities which can support the use of novel and unlicensed radionuclides, for both diagnosis and therapy. It also houses a facility for non-imaging investigations (e.g. Glomerular Filtration Rate, GFR) with sample counting, radiochromatography and associated lab equipment.

A recent addition has been the establishment of a 3D digital imaging laboratory, which provides post-processing support for imaging investigations, enabling image analysis to be undertaken in a quality-controlled environment. The 3D lab provides support for researchers wishing to undertake novel or non-standard image processing and works collaboratively with companies to provide technology assessment, independent verification of clinical software and beta-trialling of new software releases.

The directorate offers a comprehensive imaging service with full range of imaging modalities:

• A portfolio of Nuclear Medicine non-imaging examinations including GFR, cell labelling and radionuclide therapies
• Radiation Protection Assessment – IRAS review (MREC)
• Radiation Protection Assessment – Local Review
• Preparation and Submission of ARSAC application
• 3D imaging post-processing for data analysis

Legislative compliance timelines:

• Radiation Protection Assessment** – IRAS review (MREC): 15 working days
• Radiation Protection Assessment** – Local review: 15 working days
• Preparation and submission of ARSAC application** : 15 working days
• Clinical Radiation Expert (CRE) Opinion** – 15 working days

**Where the Radiation Protection Assessment, ARSAC application or CRE Opinion highlights issues which need a response from the PI or Sponsor, these will be communicated within the 15 working day window. Upon receipt of the response, the turnaround time for sign-off will be within 10 working days unless further clarification from PI or Sponsor is required. In such circumstances MIMP will endeavour to reach sign-off at the earliest possible opportunity.

Contacts

Primary contact

MIMP Research Coordinators

Sally Fleming & Bridget Billingham

C507b
Royal Hallamshire Hospital
Sheffield
S10 2JF

Tel: 0114 2711813

sally.fleming1@nhs.net
bridget.billingham@nhs.net

Please direct initial enquiries to Sally and Bridget and continue to copy them in to all correspondence with colleagues in MIMP.

Please copy your R&D Coordinator into all correspondence with Imaging and remember to always include your STH reference number.