WINNIPEG – The federal government has chosen three organizations, including a Manitoba partnership, to work on developing a new medical isotope.
Prairie Isotope Production Enterprise in Manitoba, the University of Alberta and a B.C. group will share about $21 million for their work.
The isotope known as TC-99m is used for medical imaging, often to diagnose diseases such as cancer and heart disease.
Canada experienced a shortage of medical isotopes following the shutdown of a nuclear reactor in Chalk River, Ont., in 2009.
The new work is aimed at producing isotopes without a nuclear reactor.
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Prairie Isotope Production Enterprise, or PIPE, is getting $7.46 million for its project. PIPE is a partnership of the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, Health Sciences Centre (HSC), the University of Winnipeg and Acsion Industries in Pinawa.
The world supply of medical isotopes is principally produced by two nuclear reactors, one in Canada and one in The Netherlands. The supply is unreliable, creating risk for patients, said Dr. Kennedy Mang’era, head of the WRHA’s radiopharmaceuticals research group and director of HSC’s radiopharmacy.
The group wants to develop a way to produce medical isotopes using a linear, or particle, accelerator.
“Linear accelerator technology is an innovative, inexpensive and environmentally friendly approach to isotope production,” Mang’era said in a news release.
PIPE said it’s demonstrated that high-quality technetium-99 (Tc-99m) – the most widely used isotope for medical imaging – can be extracted from linear accelerator-produced molybdemum-99 (Mo-99) without using radioactive materials or generating radioactive waste.
A Saskatoon linear accelerator produces the Mo-99, which is then taken to HSC. It decays to a form of Tc-99m that is separated from the Mo-99 and purified at the HSC. The new funding will pay for testing of the purified Tc-99m and clinical trials.
PIPE’s objective is to license it for patient use and become a regional supplier for Western Canada and northern Ontario by 2016.
There were worldwide isotope shortages in 2007, 2009 and 2010. With two more linear accelerators producing Mo-99, PIPE officials said they believe they could supply the entire Canadian market with a stable source of the most commonly used medical isotope.
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