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News - Cambridge Memorial Hospital, Cambridge Ontario Canada |
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| Cambridge Memorial Hospital |
| Hospital continues to deliver patient care |
| Date : - 11/12/2007 |
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Cambridge, ON (Dec. 10, 2007) – Cambridge Memorial Hospital President & CEO Julia Dumanian says the worldwide shortage of medical isotopes is putting a strain on operations but it isn’t affecting patient care.
“We’re doing our utmost to provide our patients with the very best in diagnostic treatment,” Ms. Dumanian says as CMH continues to wrestle with the global shortage of isotopes caused by the shutdown of the Canadian nuclear reactor that supplies most of the world’s demand.
Isotopes are injected into patients to allow nuclear imaging equipment to produce detailed scans to better diagnose cancer and other diseases. For today’s procedures, CMH received from its supplier nine bone doses and two cardiac doses. In a normal day, the hospital would conduct 12-15 tests using medical isotopes.
Cambridge Memorial Hospital has a confirmed shipment of seven bone doses for Tuesday and four cardiac doses for Wednesday. All shipments of the radioactive material come to CMH in a pre-loaded syringe and are specific for the diagnosis of the individual patient receiving care.
“We’re seeing our supply continue over 48-hour intervals and beyond that, it’s day by day,” says Ms. Dumanian.
Since the incident began last week, there have been no patient transfers from Cambridge Memorial Hospital to other nearby hospitals because of the shortage of isotopes, confirms Chief of Staff Dr. Cathy Morris.
“We’ve been successful in accommodating our patients either through the use of isotopes we’re received daily or through alternative diagnostic procedures that are all part of the investigative methods used in such cases,” says Dr. Morris.
While the lack of a confirmed supply of isotopes puts additional strain on medical staff, Dr. Morris says the hospital is employing various strategies to cope with the situation and patient safety is number one on everybody’s chart.
“We’re doing everything we can to accommodate our patients and to cope with this external problem facing healthcare institutions across Canada and around the world,” says Dr. Morris. “We’re working with family physicians and specialists on assessing the priorities for certain tests and then calling patients to inform them of the situation.”
Alternative diagnostic procedures:
Echocardiograms are used to measure the efficient pumping function of a beating heart.
CT (Computed Tomography) uses x-rays rather than radioisotopes to take “slices” through the body. CT scans are an alternative method of diagnosing pulmonary embolisms (blood clots) in the lung. |
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| Reference : - www.cmh.org |
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