Last month, the Children’s Cancer Hospital 57357 acquired an advanced model of the chemical radioactive machine related to the PET/CT scan. This acquisition is in line with Hospital policy of continuously up grading its equipment to ensure sustainability and increase the capacity of production of top quality services to cancer patients.
Unlike the previous device, the new one is capable of performing two cycles, which contributes to increasing the amount of the produced radioactive substance used for the PET/CT scan, facing the increased number of patients and saving time.
According to Dr. Magdy Hafez, the Chemical Synthesis Module, is supplementary to the cyclotron, in that it produces the radioactive material that is used to perform the PET/CT scan. This scan enables to diagnose cancer at its earliest formation at the cellular level and is also used to follow up on the disease progression and evaluate the extent of the patient benefit from the treatment. “To carry out the PET-CT scan, glucose is attached to the radioactive material which is injected into the body. Since the tumor cells are binging on glucose, they absorb glucose and the radioactive material attached to it. An hour later the imagery shows the areas with malignant cells” Hafez added.
Moreover, this up-graded device will also contribute to increasing the Hospital’s income because of the ability to cater to increased surplus service cases among the adult population. It is noteworthy that the cyclotron unit has been established in 2010 and since then it has been one of the prominent centers that produces and distributes the radioactive substance to all medical centers in Egypt.
