PET treatment to aid cancer patients in Gujarat

Ahmedabad, May 27 (UNI) The Nuclear Medicine and Positron Emission Tomography (PET), two powerful techniques, which in combinatiion can effetively diagnose cancer at a very early stage will now be available at Apollo hospital in Gujarat.

Department of Nuclear Medicine's Senior Consultant at Apollo Hospital (New Delhi) Dr Uma Ravishankar told mediapersons here yesterday that the combination of these two different medical techniques can do wonders in treating cancer patients.

Dr Uma said, Nuclear Medicines is a form of medical imaging that looks more at the physiology of the body and is alos able to view the anatomy, while PET is a powerful imaging technique that holds great promise in the diagnosis and treatment of many diseases, particularly cancer.

Dr Uma said, the Nuclear Medicines is accomplished by intervenously injecting radiopharmaceuticals into the body and then recording their distribution by taking images with gamma camera.

The radiopharmaceuticals are radioisotopes, mainly technitium-99m, labelled or chemically connected to pharmaceuticals, which are chemicals designed to trace particular organs within the body, she said.

She added that the radiopharmaceuticals once injected into the body are stable and unreactive. This is because pharmaceuticals are based in naturally occurring elements, such as phosphorus and potassium that are found within the body.

Other advnatage is that the patient does not experience side-effects like nausea, dizziness or headaches, after injection, she added.

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