Nuclear medicine is a safe, painless, and cost-effective technique to image the body and treat disease. It is a way to gather medical information that would otherwise be unavailable, require surgery, or necessitate more expensive diagnostic tests. Nuclear medicine imaging procedures often identify abnormalities very early in the progress of a disease, long before many medical problems are apparent with other diagnostic tests.
Nuclear medicine uses very small amounts of radioactive materials (radiopharmaceuticals) to diagnose and sometimes treat disease. In imaging, the radiopharmaceuticals are detected by special types of cameras (gamma cameras) that work with computers to provide very precise pictures about the area of the body being imaged. In treatment, the radiopharmaceuticals go directly to the organ being treated.
The amount of radiation in a typical nuclear imaging procedure is comparable with that received during a diagnostic x-ray, and the amount received in a typical treatment procedure is kept within safe limits.
Today, nuclear medicine offers procedures that are essential in many medical specialties, from pediatrics to cardiology to psychiatry. New and innovative nuclear medicine treatments that target and pinpoint molecular levels within the body are revolutionizing our understanding of and approach to a range of diseases and conditions.
Commonly performed General Nuclear Medicine procedures at Wentworth-Douglass Hospital include:
Wentworth-Douglass Hospital
789 Central Avenue
Dover, New Hampshire 03820
Phone: (603) 742-5252
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