Global Hospital has made nuclear medicine as a focus area for diagnosis and has established a state-of-the art department there. Nuclear medicine is emerging as a preferred diagnostic tool as it offers accuracy, speed of operation and comfort to the patient. Speaking to Pharmabiz, Dr S Sumati, consultant, Nuclear Medicine & PET - CT Division of the Hospital said that nuclear medicine studies measure the physiological functioning of the body, and they can be used to diagnose a multitude of medical conditions such as heart disease, kidney and bone diseases, spread of cancer, thyroid disease and infection or inflammatory diseases.

Further SPECT (Single-photon Emission Computed Tomography) studies of the brain can help in the diagnosis of stroke, dementia, seizures and atypical or unresponsive aggressive behaviour. Nuclear medicine has a tremendous potential and has now emerged as a prominent discipline in the field of molecular imaging, she remarked.

According to Dr Sumati, Molecular Imaging helps to diagnose diseases at the cellular level, whether it is Cancer or neurological disorder such as Alzheimer's disease or Parkinson's disease. It is also valuable in monitoring treatment response and detecting recurrence of disease at an early stage. Most of the cellular alterations occur before any morphological alteration takes place and therefore helps in early diagnosis of disease.

Positron Emission Tomography (PET) using FDG (Flouro-deoxyglucose) is a nuclear medicine technique of Molecular Imaging which helps in studying the metabolism of different organs. By combining structure and function in the same image (Fused PET-CT), precise localization of the disease is possible which is significantly more accurate in assessing the overall cancer staging compared with stand-alone CT, stand-alone PET, and side-by-side CT plus PET in various clinical studies.

Today it has a well established role in the diagnosis and management of various cancers and is an integral part of clinical work-up of a cancer patient.

Dr Sumati said that the potential of PET-CT imaging has been expanding over the years and is now increasingly being used for detection of orthopaedic infections, fever of unknown origin and inflammatory disorders. In addition, FDG-PET may prove to be an important method for detecting atherosclerosis and blood clots.

In view of the growing importance of nuclear medicine, Global Hospital and Health City are jointly organizing a scientific seminar on Nuclear Medicine on August 8. Dr BA Krishna, HoD of the Department of Nuclear Medicine, P D Hinduja Hospital, Mumbai and Dr Venkatesh Rangarajan, professor & in-charge, Bio-imaging Unit, Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai are the guest speakers in the seminar.

In the seminar, Dr B A Krishna will deliver a speech on 'Molecular Imaging in Benign Disorders' and Dr Venkatesh will speak on 'Molecular Imaging in Oncology'. Doctors from leading hospitals across the country are participating in the seminar.