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Bone Scan - this is the most common study in Nuclear Medicine, using a phosphate compound labeled with a short lived tracer called Technetium (99mTc). An example of a bone scan is shown above. The bone scan will reveal stress fracture, fracture, infection or cancer in the bone or joints. After injection of the tracer, the patient will be asked to drink plenty of fluid, unless if the patient is on fluid restriction. Scanning will be performed 2 or more hours afterwards. A whole body scan will typically take about an hour to perform.
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Cardiac Studies - there are several types of heart studies in Nuclear Medicine. The most common study is a myocardial perfusion scan to access coronary heart disease. This is usually a two part study. Typically, the first part is a resting myocardial perfusion scan--scanning is performed about 30 minutes after the tracer is given to the patient intravenously in a resting condition. The second part is a stress myocardial perfusion scan. Injection of the tracer is done while the patient is exercising on a treadmill machine.
If the patient cannot exercise well, a pharmacological stress study can be performed instead. The patient will be given a medicine, that dilates heart blood vessels or makes the heart work faster, before the radiotracer is injected. In our department, this study takes about half a day to complete.
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Other studies:
Brain scans - commonly used to diagnose dementia (e.g. Alzheimer's disease), strokes, brain death and tumor.
Thyroid studies - evaluate thyroid nodules and function of the thyroid.
Parathyroid studies - detect and localize parathyroid adenoma in patients with elevated blood calcium.
Lung studies - commonly used to detect blood clots in the lungs (pulmonary emboli).
Gastrointerstinal(GI) Bleeding study - for localizing active GI bleeding.
Gallbladder study - for evaluation of patients with abdominal pain, suspected to have acute inflammation of the gallbladder (acute cholecystitis) or chronic gallbladder disease.
Renal study - evalaute renal hypertension, impaired renal function or obstruction of urine drainage from the kidneys.
Gallium scan - detect infection, active pulmonary fibrosis, or cancer of lymph glands (lymphoma/Hodgkin's disease).
White Cell Scan - for detecting active infection in the body.
Positron Emission Tomography (P.E.T.) Imaging - detect and stage many forms of cancer, diagnose dementia(e.g. Alzheimer's disease), localize epileptic focus in the brain, and assess the severity of coronary heart disease. For more information, please use the link below to visit San Diego Regional P.E.T. center's website (http://www.sdpet.com).
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