St. Joseph's Health Care has been promised a precious shipment of a scarce medical isotope to be received today.
The nuclear material will be used for breast cancer surgeries and bone scans for cancer.
"It's going to allow us to handle our most urgent patients," hospital spokesperson Betty Dann said last Thursday.
St. Joseph's, London Health Sciences Centre and hospitals across the region have been caught in the worldwide shortage of the medical isotope supplied from a reactor in Chalk River, ON.
The radioactive isotope is injected into a patient's vein and can be captured by a sophisticated camera.
Hundreds of patients in the London area have had their cancer and cardiac tests rescheduled last week because the aging Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. reactor has been shut down longer than expected for maintenance.
"The partial isotope shipment expected on Monday, will allow St. Joseph's to scan eight patients," Dann said.
"If St. Joseph's patients haven't been notified their appointment has been changed, they should keep it," Dann said.
St. Thomas Elgin General Hospital usually does 10 to 15 tests a day with the isotope, plus emergency cases.
Last week, the hospital has been receiving enough for only two scans a day.
"We are able to do a dose for a patient that needs a lung scan and a dose for a patient that needs a cardiac scan each day," said Anita Grant, the hospital's director of patient care.
Meanwhile, the federal government is demanding the maker of the crucial isotopes sort out technical problems that have crippled production....................................
London Free Press".......................................................To be continued"
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