Nuclear Medicine

Nuclear Medicine

Nuclear Medicine uses radiation to provide diagnostic information about the functioning of organs to treat them. It uses small amounts of radioactive material to treat diseases such as cancer, heart disease, gastrointestinal endocrine, neurological disorders, and other abnormalities within the body. Today about one- third of all procedures used in modern hospitals involve radiation or radioactivity. These procedures are safer and generally painless, and don’t require the administration of amnesia. The uses of these procedures are very broad, spanning many specialties of medicine including pediatrics, cardiology, and psychiatry.

Nuclear medicine uses the administration of radioisotopes (an element that has an unstable nucleus that decays, thus admitting alpha, beta, or gamma rays, until stability is reached) into the body internally. The radioisotopes can be administered by injection, orally, or by inhalation. The radiation these radioisotopes admit can be located in the body. A gamma camera is used to capture images from isotopes in the body that emit radiation. Computers are then used to enhance the images so that physicians can detect tumors, fractures, measure blood flow, or determine thyroid and pulmonary functions. Radioisotopes are also essential to the medical research that seeks to find causes and cures for AIDS, cancer, anf Alzheimer's disease. The first radiopharmaceutical was the fission- product, Iodine-131 in the form of the simple salt, sodium iodine. This served as a diagnostic test for certain thyroid disorders.

A common use of radioisotopes is Myocardial perfusion imaging maps which allow physicians to measure the blood flow to the heart, therefore allowing them to see whether or not a patient has heart disease and then determine the most effective treatment for that specific case. Another use of nuclear medicine is bone scans, these scans can detect the spread of cancer into the bones up to eighteen months before X- rays can. Imaging with radioactive technetium-99 can also help diagnose bone infections at the earliest possible stage. Kidney scans are also much more sensitive than X- rays and ultrasounds when it comes to evaluating kidney function. These diagnostic procedure involve very small amounts of radioisotopes, however, in higher doses, these  same radioisotopes can be very helpful in treating disease. For example, the use of radioactive iodine is very common in the therapy for thyroid cancer because it results in a lower recurrence rate than drug therapy. It also avoids potentially fatal side effects that come with chemotherapy such as the destruction of bone marrow. Currently, nearly half of all cancer patients in the United States receive radiation treatment at some point in their treatment course.

Whereas radioisotopes are administered into the body, other forms of radioactivity are not. Things such as X-rays, MRI scanners, CAT scanners, and ultrasounds penetrate the body from the outside, using nuclear science to diagnose pre-existing conditions. Forms of nuclear imagery include PET scans (Positron Emission Tomography), SPECT scans ( Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography), and cardiovascular imaging. Hospitals can also use radiation to sterilize materials which helps prevent the spread of disease. Exposing tools to this radiation does not make them radioactive, however. The photo on the left shows a regular bone scan while the photo on the right shows a bone scan with the administration of radioisotopes.

Works Cited

http://www.nuclearconnect.org/know-nuclear/applications/medical-uses

https://www.nei.org/Knowledge-Center/Other-Nuclear-Energy-Applications/Medicine-Scientific-Research