(MENAFN- The Peninsula) People with oncology and cardiology problems would soon experience the most novel technology in nuclear medicine at Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC), said a senior health expert yesterday.
Nuclear medicine involves the use of radioactive material and diagnostic technology to aid treatment and management of conditions, including hyperthyroidism, tumours, bone pain and some types of cancer.
At HMC, nuclear medicine is used mostly for diagnosing different types of cancer and cardiology problems, said Dr Huda Al Naemi (pictured), Executive Director, Occupational Health and Safety Department, HMC, on the sidelines of the sixth Gulf Nuclear Medicine Conference being held in Doha.
For more accurate diagnosis, HMC is preparing to introduce the most advanced technology known as Positron emission tomography€magnetic resonance imaging (PET-MRI), she said.
"In most cases we use nuclear medicine for diagnosis than for therapy. For kidneys, liver and bones we can see to what level cancer is distributed. Some heart diseases also can be diagnosed by nuclear medicine," she added.
During the nuclear medicine imaging procedure, patients are given radiopharmaceuticals that can be inhaled, injected or swallowed, which then emit gamma rays.
The rays can be detected through specialised cameras that work in conjunction with computers to provide images of the area of the body being scanned.
This offers the potential for physicians to identify diseases in their earliest stages and determine a patient's immediate response to therapeutic interventions.
"The idea is to use radioactive material in the body of the patient either by injection, oral or inhalation and make the body absorb it into cells and the body will be the source of radiation," said Dr Al Naemi.
Nuclear medicine therapy is also used at HMC for some types of cancer like thyroid cancer.
"To cure some types of cancer, like thyroid cancer, we inject radioactive iodine in the patient, which will directly go to the thyroid and kill the cells," said Dr Al Naemi.
However, patients who are given some level of radiation can be sent home, but not those who receive high levels of radiation because they are the source and others like children can be exposed to it.
"HMC does not have facility to hospitalise radioactive patients. So it gives the patient a particular level of radiation so that they can be sent home. But when the new cancer hospital opens, there will be facilities to hospitalise and treat patients with nuclear medicine," said Dr Al Naemi, also Chairperson of the conference.
More than 20 speakers, half of them from Gulf countries and over 300 local and regional delegates, including diagnostic radiologists, technologists, medical oncologists, medical physicists, shared aspects of and new technologies in nuclear medicine.
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