Theme
Nuclear Medicine
INSTITUTION
Inaya Medical College
Nuclear Medicine Technology Department
Nuclear medicine is a medical specialty that is used to diagnose and treat diseases in a safe and painless way. The procedures often identify abnormalities very early in the progression of a disease long before other diagnostic modalities. The preparation of the patients for a nuclear medicine exam varies because each study is different. So evaluation of the information provided to patients undergoing diagnostic nuclear medicine procedures is very important to avoid missing diagnosing. Our study aimed to evaluate the awareness among the patients with instructions necessary before different nuclear medicine studies. Methods: Five different surveys (for Bone, thyroid, renal, cardiac and PET scan) were designed and published in several hospitals in Saudi Arabia, 172 responses were collected, the results of the surveys were compiled along with the instructions of two organizations (British Nuclear Medicine Society & Radiologyinfo.org).
Results: For the Bone scan, 52% of patients were aware that they can eat and drink normally before the scan and 36% didn’t drink a lot of fluids. For the thyroid scan, 73% they followed the instructions and they stopped their medications otherwise, 57% didn’t stop taking multivitamins. For the renal Scan, the patients should be well hydrated before the study, 77% were aware of this. For the cardiac scan, patients instructed to avoid caffeine 24hours before the study, 40% only were aware of this. And for PET, the patients should fast for 4 hrs., 86% said they were fasting, lastly only 26% avoid any strenuous exercise before the PET scan by 24hs.
The survey analysis elaborates the importance of awareness for patients about the instructions for the different scans in nuclear medicine, as it may affect the scan results. It was concluded that the awareness for most of the nuclear medicine scans does not reach a satisfactory level. For that reason, society for such speciality is in need to increase awareness among patients with important instruction to avoid false positive, false-negative results.