preview

Nuclear Medicine Research Paper

Decent Essays

Each year 12.7 million people are diagnosed with cancer and 7.6 million people die from disease. While this is a global problem, 13.7 million people in the United States alone have cancer. While there is not a cure for the disease, there are many different ways to help reduce it. One of those ways is nuclear medicine and nuclear imaging. Nuclear medicine is used to diagnose and treat many people that are living with cancer and other similar illnesses.
Nuclear medicine is used in all sorts of ways. It is mainly used in nuclear medicine imaging. Nuclear medicine has really helped the development of the medicine industry. It is safe, harmless and non-invasive diagnostic and treatment solutions. Nuclear medicine uses small amounts of radioactive …show more content…

It is considered prudent for public safety to assume that every exposure to ionizing radiation, no matter how small, carries some small risk of unwanted health effects. The reason for nuclear medicine is to help heal the unwanted diseases in someone’s body. CT scans are very helpful because they avoid invasive surgery that take hours and have risks with being under anesthesia (medicine & scientific research, n.d.). These scans help guide the treatment for many different diseases and injuries like car accidents, cancer, blood clots in the lungs and many more. According to the NCRP “Approximately 68 million CT scans were performed in the United States in 2006”(Medicine & scientific research, n.d.). Bone scans can detect the spread of cancer 6 to 18 months earlier than X-rays, kidney scans are much more sensitive than X-rays or ultrasounds in fully evaluating kidney function, and imaging with radioactive technetium-99 can help diagnose bone infections at the earliest possible stage (Medicine & scientific research, …show more content…

This actually helps shrink the tumors, rather than just diagnose them. It uses high-energy radiation to help cure the tumors and kill the cancer cells. Gamma rays and charged particles are types of radiation used for cancer treatment. Treatment can be delivered in two ways; a machine outside the body which is an external beam, or a radioactive material that is placed in the body near the cancer cells, which is called brachytherapy (radiation therapy for cancer, n.d.). Radiation therapy is different from chemotherapy, which exposes the whole body to cancer-fighting drugs. Radiation therapy, on the other hand, is local, its aimed at, and effects only the parts it needs to. The, “goal is to damage cancer cells without harming healthy cells” (How does radiation therapy work, 2015). Radiation therapy is preferred to chemotherapy because it tends to not harm the rest of the body, just the spot that is needed. Radiation therapy is a good option when someone is diagnosed with cancer, even with the

Get Access