Image of the Year

The organization SNM has named its "Image of the Year," and the award goes to this image showing the effectiveness of RadioImmunoTherapies (RIT) Bexxar and Zevalin (of which I have written fondly many times in the past):




Isn't it beautiful?


The images are from PET scans that show reduced cancer activity (the dark spots). The first two are the Before and After for Bexxar, and the third and fourth are for Zevalin. You can see the reduction of dark spots (not all the spots are cancerous).


The image is from a study at Stanford that looked at Bexxar's and Zevalin's effectiveness for patients with relapsed NHL. You know how RIT works: it identifies b-cells and kills them off with a shot of radiation delivered right to those cells. The overall study confirmed the effectiveness of RIT for many patients, and the lead invesitigator is excited to see how RIT works as a first treatment for NHL (it's only approved now for patients who have already received another treatment and had it return).


Very encouraging, as always. Despite RIT's strange reimbursement structure and complexity in administering, the article points out that RIT treatments cost about half of what a course of chemo costs, so maybe insurers will start pushing it more. I hope so. It's too good a weapon to ignore for bureaucratic reasons.


SNM, the organization that gave out the image award, is "an international scientific and professional organization of more than 16,000 members dedicated to promoting the science, technology and practical applications of molecular imaging and therapy and nuclear medicine to diagnose, manage and treat diseases." Nice to know there are so many people who think so highly of RIT. I hope they'll push hard for more widespread use.


Interestingly, I looked at SNM's web site for about 20 minutes, and couldn't find anything that told me what "SNM" stood for, so the site is either really poorly written, or they just think it's neat to have only initials, like LL Cool J (Mama said knock that cancer out!). But I did find out that you can get an SNM hat or "cardiac necktie" in either gray or blue, with a repeating pattern of a diagnostic image of a heart. (Keep in mind, though, that the tie is $6 cheaper if you're a member of SNM.)