BMJ  2006;333:293-294 (5 August), doi:10.1136/bmj.333.7562.293

Practice

Lesson of the week

Triggering radiation alarms after radioiodine treatment

¹ Department of Medicine, Diabetes, and Endocrinology, City Hospital, Birmingham B18 7QH, ² Department of Nuclear Medicine, City Hospital, Birmingham

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Increasing numbers of diagnostic and therapeutic procedures involving radioisotopes are being conducted. The most common procedures include thallium scans for myocardial perfusion, ventilation perfusion lung scans, bone scans, iodine uptake scans, and radioactive iodine as treatment for thyroid disorders. For thyrotoxicosis, for example, 10 000 patients received radioactive iodine (¹³¹I) treatment in one year in the United Kingdom alone.¹

Such procedures make patients temporarily radioactive and can be an important cause of false alarms at airports by activating radiation detectors. Doctors show a worrying lack of awareness about such potential problems. As a result, patients receiving radioactive isotopes for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes are not adequately warned about persisting radioactivity and precautions that need to be taken.² We report a case that further highlights this problem.

A 46 year old man was referred to our endocrine clinic in July 2003 with a history of weight loss, sweating, and diarrhoea. . . . [Full text of this article]

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This article has been cited by other articles:

• Paz-Filho, G. J., Busnello, J. V., Licinio, J., Zelmanovitz, F. (2008). Radioiodine Treatment Triggers Security Alarms: Case Report and Review of Literature. JNM 49: 337-337 [Full text]  
• Iagaru, A., McDougall, I. R. (2007). Treatment of Thyrotoxicosis. JNM 48: 379-389 [Abstract] [Full text]  
• Cuthbertson, D. J, Davidson, J. (2006). What to tell patients about radioiodine therapy.. BMJ 333: 271-272 [Full text]  

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