This is my final blog so I write it with a teary eye and a reflective air. It has been my privilege to lead our society for the past 2 years. I inherited a good position from my predecessor John Buscombe but we will were still bearing the scars from covid. The BNMS has risen like a phoenix out of the covid ashes with our most successful meetings in recent memory. The energy at Glasgow was palpable and so many of you enjoyed such a great meeting in a vibrant city. Swansea sold out – need I say more. I am looking forward to Harrogate as there is much to discuss and learn about nuclear medicine at the moment. The programme has been well put together by the Science and Education Committee and Harrogate is a great environment with a particularly fine tea room – Bettys!
 
During my tenure there have been several big themes:
 
• Continuity of radiotracer supply. This continues to be an issue with the UK not possessing our own medical isotope reactor and the vagaries of world supply. The BNMS have advised government and departments on how best navigate this. We are also supporting a review to radio pharmacy provision in England with the aim of improving tracer availability and baking more redundancy into our system.
• Theranostics . This is the buzz word in nuclear medicine circles around the globe. We have yet to see mass adoption in the UK and we still wait for NICE to approve Lu177-PSMA. Once this occurs our theranostic journey will have really begun and then building our people and infrastructure will be the next challenge.
• PET-CT. PET-CT continues to grow exponenially with annual growth of 15-20%. The wave 1 national contract is coming up for retender and the BNMS is influencing this space to ensure that our patients get the scans they need going forward. We are also in a stakeholder in the decision as to where to place two Total Body PET-CTs in the UK which is a really exciting development.
• Workforce.  We are challenged in all craft groups. We have been working to unblock the barriers to training, recruitment and retention and will continue to do so as the much to do in this space. 

There are too many people for me to thank by name. I would like to thank all of you for the support you have given me which has enabled me to do my best for us. I would specifically like to thank the BNMS office, the BNMS officers and all those who serve on BNMS committees. I was excited to see the recent contest for a vacant council seat from 4 great contenders. I would urge the three unsuccessful people to get involved with the BNMS in another way such as serving on one of our other committees. If anyone wants to get more involved please contact the BNMS office and they will direct you to correct person to talk to.

Finally, I am confident that Jilly Croasdale will be an excellent President and will take our society further. I am confident she will cut a dash in the Harry Potteresque robes of office!

Prof Richard Graham

BNMS President

There is seat coming up on BNMS council and I would encourage anyone who wants to get more involved with the BNMS to stand. We are also always looking for people for our science and education committee and professional standards committees so if you feel the calling in these directions, please get in touch with the BNMS office. From my perspective the BNMS is really thriving, and we currently heavily involved with MRT and PET-CT commissioning. On the subject of MRT it was disappointing that NICE did not approve Lu177 PSMA and we will continue to argue for this for the benefit of our patients.

The programme for our Harrogate meeting looks great and registrations are flowing in. I really enjoyed our Glasgow meeting and I hope this meeting will be just as good. Get you registration in now so you don't miss out, our Swansea meeting was sold out. It is only 94 days to go! We are in a good financial position as a society, and we have been looking at making sure or membership/meeting registration fees are good value for the lower paid members and trainees particularly. Charnie is working with Charlotte to make our fees equitable across all our membership groups.  

As you know I send out EANM draft guidelines to the membership when they become available, and I have been really impressed with the thorough reviews many of you have been sending back to me which I have passed onto the EANM. It is great to see so much interest in contributing to the European guidance. These guidelines are important as the national practice often references them. Thank you to all those who have contributed to make these guidelines better.

Finally, the NHS national clinical impact awards are out. Congratulations to all those in nuclear medicine who received them - these are really hard to get represent a significant achievement across a range of professional medical activities. Those who were unsuccessful please apply again next time and use the feedback scores to improve your application. Going forward the scheme is changing and there will no longer be citations from nominating bodies like the BNMS or Royal Colleges as the scheme has determined they make very little difference in the outcome. The BNMS are now not allowed to review applications but can offer generic advice which Stewart will be putting on our website.

Prof Richard Graham

BNMS President

The molybdenum shortage has mostly abated which is great for our patients. I was interviewed on BBC radio Northern Ireland about it as they were interested about the implications of a nuclear reactor fault and was this another Chernobyl! I was able to reassure the people of Northern Ireland and explain the importance of nuclear medicine.

The molecular radiotherapy consortium continues to develop and the BNMS is a key stakeholder in this. We are well represented by Glen Flux and Sabina Disdarevic on its steering committee. We hope that NICE will approve Lu177 PSMA in January and that then we can treat our patients on the NHS.  Once approved we will need to build staffing and infrastructure to deliver this new service. Industry partners will be keen to support this, I think.

NHS England has started to work on the service specification for the next round of PET-CT commissioning. The BNMS is stakeholder in this and I will keep you posted as this develops. I would like to congratulate Wai-Lup Wong who has been appointed as the National Speciality Advisor for Nuclear Medicine at NHS England.  This extends his previous PET-CT role to encompass all of diagnostic and therapeutic nuclear medicine.

Abstract submission is opening for our BNMS Spring meeting so I would encourage you to submit and attend the meeting which I am sure will be a great success given the form of our recent meetings.

I wish you all a merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! I hope you all get a well-earned break and have some time to recharge before the onslaught of ever-increasing demand we will all experience next year.

Prof Richard Graham

BNMS President

The autumn BNMS meeting in Swansea was fantastic. Neil Hartman and team delivered a truly memorable meeting from both the perspective of the program and the entertainment! The program would not have looked out of place at an international meeting. The impromptu Welsh choir and clog dancing were a welcome addition not seen a BNMS in my time as a member! The meeting was sold out which I think may be a first for the BNMS but is a good barometer about the health of British nuclear medicine. I would like to thank industry for the support they gave the meeting. There was lots of delegate interaction with our industry colleagues which was great to see. The tour of Swansea nuclear medicine department was a popular event where people saw the first GE Starguide 360 CZT scanner in the UK in operation.

 
Theranostics was a key theme at the meeting with a lot of excitement about future possibilities. I learnt about the idea of giving a parent radionuclide for MRT to achieve the effect through the daughter which is something as a jobbing imager I hadn’t really considered. The formed Medial Director for Practice at the RCR gave a talk on Duty of Candour in imaging which had standing room only and prompted much debate.
 
I spoke in a session on 360 CZT imaging where initial experiences from the two available systems: the Vertion CT from Spectrum Dynamics and the GE Starguide were communicated. It was interesting to see how the systems delivered similar advantages but also differences in the way the two centres, Bath and Swansea had chosen to implement them. The session stimulated a lot of questions and good quality discussion. In my view 360 CZT will become the mainstream way we do SPECT CT. When was the last time you did a planar PET-CT?
 
The nuclear reactor that supplies Mo in Belgium has broken and there is currently a Mo shortage. The BNMS has put guidance on our website about what to do. Please read it if you have not already done so. We will update this as the shortage continues about how to prioritise your work and radiology alternative studies that can be done to off load nuclear medicine pathways.
Thank you all once again for all you are doing both directly and indirectly for our patients at this really challenging time to be delivering healthcare.

Prof Richard Graham

BNMS President

Winter has arrived in the NHS. Ambulances are queuing to off load patients and we are failing to achieve cancer targets. The elective backlog has never been so great. This is a difficult time to lead in healthcare and I wish our new Secretary of State – Dr Thérèse Coffey good luck in her endeavours. It is interesting for us that Dr Coffey’s PhD was in molybdenum so at least we have something in common! Maybe this will mean a new ear era of political understanding in nuclear medicine.
 
This month the BNMS has been supporting the foundation of the Molecular Radiotherapy Consortium. We are in negotiations to host it and I think this avenue of work for us will be very important going forward. The predictions for the amount of  prostate carcinoma MRT we will be undertaking in the future are large and we will need significant resourcing in people and infrastructure if we are to deliver this for our patients.
 
We continue to support he national review of radiopharmacy being undertaken by DHSC to help the formulation of the future radiopharmacy strategy. Radiopharmacy is such a key constituent of our services and it hasn’t been given the attention it deserves by government in recent times so this new found attention is greatly appreciated.
 
The work on standards in PET-CT for delivery and commissioning continues. I have heard rumours that PET-CT will be commissioned by Integrated Care Systems in the future. If this is true our guidance will be invaluable for them and will come at an opportune time.
 
The society is financially sound through the careful management of Charlotte Weston and our treasurers past and present in the form of Jilly Croasdale and Charnie Kalirai. I would like to thank them as this is enabling us to work effectively to advocate for our vital speciality and not to be distracted having to solve financial difficulties that some societies are now facing.
 
The autumn BNMS meeting is almost upon us and will be on the 11th and 12th of November in Swansea. The programme looks excellent and I would urge you to register if you have not done so already. I am looking forward to seeing many of you there and I would like to thank Neil Hartman and team for organising this great event which includes dinner in the National Waterfront Museum. Traditional entertainment is promised too if you need another reason to attend!

Prof Richard Graham

BNMS President