High Country continues to attract and blend experts from academia and industry, with leaders in medical specialties, the regulatory agencies and health care researchers in an informal setting to facilitate dialog and an exchange of ideas. The meeting consists of six to seven hours of structured sessions per day (8 sessions total). In between sessions, roundtable discussions will be held and there are ample opportunities for independent meetings and networking. The 2024 meeting, with anticipated attendance of 100 participants, promises to open avenues and opportunities of collaboration on a variety of issues important to the nuclear medicine and molecular imaging community while allowing interaction and networking.
Over the course of four days, the High Country Nuclear Medicine Conference will offer 27 hours of content. No CE Credit will be offered at the 2024 Conference. The 2024 Conference will only be held in-person.
2024 Program
*All times are Mountain Time. Schedule Subject to Change.
Saturday, March 2, 2024
6:30 AM – 7:00 AM Breakfast with Vendors
7:00 AM – 9:30 AM Session: Breast Imaging
Session Chair: Bital Savir-Baruch, MD, FACNM
Co-Chair: Kevin Donohoe
Session Topics:
Guiding Treatment: The Precision of Lymphoscintigraphy in Breast Cancer
Speaker: Kevin Donohoe
Shaping Tomorrow’s Diagnosis: Molecular Breast Imaging (MBI) in Early Breast Cancer Detection
Speaker: Bital Savir-Baruch, MD, FACNM
Improving Care: FES-PET’s Essential Role in Improving the Diagnosis and Management of Metastatic Breast Cancer
Speaker: Ephraim Parent
Case-based presentation and expert panel discussion
Speaker: Panel Discussion
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM Roundtable: Breast Imaging
Lead: Bital Savir-Baruch, MD, FACNM
4:00 PM – 7:30 PM Session: Cardiology
Session Chair: Robert Miller, MD
Co-Chair: Piotr Slomka, PhD
Session Topics:
Imaging Cardiac Amyloidosis: SPECT and PET
Speaker: Sarah Cuddy, MD
Hybrid Imaging for myocardial perfusion
Speaker: Rob Miller, MD
Hybrid Imaging: Cardiac Applications of PET/MR and Novel Tracers
Speaker: Zahi Fayad, PhD
Myocardial Blood Flow Quantification: Implications for Coronary Microvascular Disease
Speaker: Panithaya Chareonthaitawee, M.D.
Novel Clinical Applications of Artificial Intelligence for Nuclear Cardiology
Speaker: Piotr Slomka, PhD
Sunday, March 3, 2024
6:30 AM – 7:00 AM Breakfast with Vendors
7:00 AM – 9:30 AM Session: Alphatherapy
Session Chair: Roy Brown, MBA
Co-Chair: Andreas Kjaer, MD, PhD, DMSc, MBA
Session Topics:
Topic 1
Speaker: Edward O’Neill
Astatine-211: Ready for prime time?
Speaker: Yutian Feng, PhD
A Pioneering Effort in Simultaneous Fr-221/Bi-213 Imaging: To Boldly Quantify as Never Before… Now What?
Speaker: Eileen Sneeden
Topic 4
Speaker: Kohshin Washiyama, Ph.D.
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM Roundtable: Thyroid Cancer, Iodine Refractory
Lead: Michael Wissmeyer, MD, PhD
4:30 PM – 7:00 PM Hal O’Brien Award Talk
Session Chair: Piotr Slomka, PhD
Session Topics:
Topic: TBD
Speaker: Courtney Lawhn Heath, MD
Using Bioinformatic Analyses to Enhance the Therapeutic Effect of Receptor Radionuclide Therapy in Neuroendocrine Tumors
Speaker: Pedram Heidari, MD
PET imaging in dementia
Speaker: Mary Ellen Koran, MD, Ph.D.
Topic: TBD
Speaker: Brittany Weber, MD, PhD
7:00 PM – 9:00 PM Sunday Night Dinner & Hal O’Brien Rising Star Award Ceremony. Open to all in-person attendees with meeting registration. Additional tickets available for guests.
Monday, March 4, 2024
6:30 AM – 7:00 AM Breakfast with Vendors
7:00 AM – 9:30 AM Session: Regulatory
Session Chair: Ira Goldman
Co-Chair: Denise Merlino
Session Topics:
Legislative Developments related to MACRA, Physician payments, etc.
Speaker: Kathy Flood
CMS coverage policy changes for beta amyloid imaging and payment policy changes(?) for diagnostic
radiopharmaceuticals
Speaker: Denise Merlino
FIND Act
Speaker: Ira Goldman
Update on NRC rule-making for medical radioisotopes (esp. amendments to patient release guidelines)
Speaker: Chris Einberg
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM Roundtable: Legislative
Lead: Ira Goldman, MA / Denise Merlino
4:00 PM- 7:30 PM Session: Neurology
Session Chair: Andrew Stephens, MD, PhD
Session Topics:
New tau tracers for primary 4R tauopathies
Speaker: Neal Vasdev
Clinical Applications of neuroinflammatory imaging agents
Speaker: Keenan Walker
The Impact of anti-amyloid AD therapies on nuclear medicine and radiology
Speaker: Satoshi Minoshima
Beyond amyloid PET; clinical utility of tau PET imaging
Speaker: Renaud La Joie
Imaging Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy
Speaker: Mike Alosco
Tuesday, March 5, 2024
6:30 AM – 7:00 AM Breakfast with Vendors
7:00 AM – 9:30 AM Session: Instrumentation
Session Chair: Hans Vija
Co-Chair: Michael Wissmeyer, MD, PhD
Session Topics:
Full ring SPECT/CT: Will it replace conventional gamma cameras and SPECT/CT systems?
Speaker: Benjamin Auer
PET/MRI in pediatrics
Speaker: Helen Nagel
Highlights for the IEEE Meeting
Speaker: Hans Vija
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM Roundtable: Instrumentation & Theranostics
Lead: Michael Wissmeyer, MD, PhD & Andreas Kjaer, MD, PhD
4:00 PM- 7:30 PM Session: Theranostics
Session Chair: Andreas Kjaer, MD, PhD
Session Topics:
Novel radionuclide therapies for neuroendocrine tumors: overview of ongoing trials