Radionuclide diagnostic

Radionuclide uses in diagnostic medicine have increased tremendously in the past several decades, and today, one-third of the annual 40-50 million diagnostic procedures in the United States are performed with radionuclides. The most widely used radionuclide in nuclear medicine is technetium-99m ( Tc, Ty = 6.0 h), the daughter of 66 h molybdenum-99 ( Mo). Tc-99m is used in 70% of all radionuclide diagnostic procedures with an estimated 16 million medical tests per year (approximately 45,000 per day) and 4—5 billion dollars cost to patients annually in the USA. 

Polyhedral Boron Hydrides in Radionuclide Diagnostics and Therapy [75]... 

Metals continue to play an important role in radiopharmaceuticals for diagnostic and therapeutic applications in nuclear medicine. Radiopharmaceuticals are drugs that contain a radionuclide and are used for imaging if the radionuclide is a photon emitter (gamma (7) or positron (/3+)) or for... 

The major driving force for the development of technetium coordination chemistry has undoubtedly been the potential applications in diagnostic nuclear medicine. The primary requirements for a radionuclide to be used in imaging are that the radiation emitted must be of appropriate energy, the decay half-life must lie in a suitable time window, it must be relatively cheap and readily available in the radiopharmacy, and finally it must have highly flexible co-ordination chemistry. 

Radiophannaceuticals are almost ideal diagnostic tools because radioisotope tracers do not alter body physiology, and they permit external monitoring with minimal instrumentation. Presently, there are three major areas of nuclear medicine (1) physiological function studies, (2) radionuclide imaging procedures, and (3) therapeutic techniques. 

Tmm is the most widely used radionuclide for diagnostic purposes. It is used in 10 million procedures per year in the United States and 20 million/per year worldwide. As discussed previously, its single 142.7-keV photon is ideal for imaging, and its 6-h half-life will accommodate most procedures with excessive radiation dose to... 

Coordination compounds have the potential to be used in both diagnostic and therapeutic applications, but only the former have been extensively developed so far. This reflects the differing nature of the two types of application. In diagnosis it is only necessary to detect the location of the radionuclide in the body. Since extremely sensitive devices are available for the detection of ionizing radiation, useful diagnostic information may be obtained with relatively low patient... 

---