Technology Never Stands Still! 31st Annual Congress Of The European Association Of Nuclear Medicine, Oct.21-25th,2017 At The Austria Center Vienna

I ( @mammasitta) never heard about nuclear medicine before my new and very interesting airbnb guest from Iran checked in to my flat in Vienna. Narjess is a Nuclear Science Professor and specialises in Thyroid cancer detection and treatment and will hold a lecture at the conference for the next 5 days. 

 Image Source 

The annual EANM Congress with over 6,200+ participants is a world leading meeting in nuclear medicine. 

The official site 

The chapter in this book includes a description of the history and major discoveries, the challenges of conducting nuclear medicine research, and the new technologies and opportunities for personalising health care that could result from aggressive development of the field.

Image Source

What is nuclear medicine?

Nuclear medicine is a branch of medical imaging that uses small amounts of radioactive material to diagnose and determine the severity of or treat a variety of diseases, including many types of cancers, heart disease, gastrointestinal, endocrine, neurological disorders and other abnormalities within the body. - Source 

 Image Source

This is a medical imaging technique that uses radiotracers to diagnose and treat disease. Radiotracers are small amounts of radioactive materials which are inhaled, swallowed or injected into the bloodstream. The radiotracer travels through the body part being examined and gives off energy which is detected by a specially designed camera and a computer to create images. - Source 

The Origins of Diseases

I mention three of them in my article since I also have a problem with my spine and suffer from pain on and off.

Thyroid Cancer 

I was curious to find out more because I was fascinated after a long and captivating chat, absorbing lots of new information about this field. I learnt that Thyroid cancer is three times more common in women than in men. 

Radioactive Iodine (Radioiodine) Therapy

Your thyroid gland absorbs nearly all of the iodine in your body. When radioactive iodine (RAI), also known as I-131, is taken into the body in liquid or capsule form, it concentrates in thyroid cells. The radiation can destroy the thyroid gland and any other thyroid cells (including cancer cells) that take up iodine, with little effect on the rest of your body. 

Back Pain

Low back pain is an increasing and extremely  widespread condition that becomes chronic in many patients, causing  severe physical and emotional distress. Moreover, back pain is one of  the leading causes of activity limitation and work absence all over the  world and thus, has an enormous economic burden.  Up to 80% of patients with back pain suffer from unspecific pain  without identifiable cause. ”But for those patients who are suspected to  have a pain generator responsible for their complaints imaging  techniques such as SPECT/CT can open up the path to efficient  treatment,” says Prof. Dr. Willm Uwe Kampen, expert from the Bone and  Joint Committee of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine (EANM)  on the occasion of the World Spine Day 2017. - Source 

http://www.eanm.org/content-eanm/uploads/2017/10/EANM_BackPain_Press_3_2017-en.pdf

Prostate Cancer and molecule imaging

I lost my brother in law two years ago and read a lot about efficient cancer treatment since that day he said good-bye. We loose too many of our loved ones to such vicious disease. 

Prostate cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death in American men, behind only lung cancer. Based on rates from 2004–2006, the National Cancer Institute estimate that one in six men will be diagnosed with cancer of the prostate during their lifetime and one in 35 will die from the disease. - Facetsheet and Source

Targeted radionuclide, a molecule therapy is currently used to treat metastatic prostate cancer. However, researchers are developing and testing new targeted radionuclide therapies.

The Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging (SNMMI) has released a new infographic showing how certain types of cancer can be treated using nuclear medicine therapy. Targeted Cancer Treatment with Nuclear Medicine Therapy is a visual guide to radioisotope therapy, a personalised treatment where a radioactive drug compound seeks and destroys cancer cells. - Source 

 Image Source

Information about the Congress in Vienna 

The EANM'17 Final Programme is available on the congress website 

https://www.facebook.com/officialEANM 

If you cannot travel to Vienna  you can take advantage of the freely available live-streaming on http://onsite.eanm.org/

I hope this article about the field of nuclear medicine was informative for the readers who are not familiar with this discipline . 

Keep on spreading the MassiVe Vibes and follow and resteem @massivevibration 

Please feel free to join our steemit.chat channels "Massivevibrations",  "Mammasittas" and "Austria"

Yours @mammasitta