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A nuclear threat to heart patients? U-M experts show impact from shortage of radioactive stress tes…
https://www.uofmhealth.org/news/archive/201609/nuclear-threat-heart-patients-u-m-experts-show-impact[font face=Serif]September 16, 2016
[font size=5]A nuclear threat to heart patients? U-M experts show impact from shortage of radioactive stress test tracer[/font]
[font size=4]As supply problems loom, study of 2010 shortage shows more risky and expensive tests got used when technetium-99m was in short supply[/font]
[font size=3]ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Nearly 15 million times a year, Americans with heart trouble climb onto a treadmill to take a stress test that can reveal blockages in their heart’s blood vessels. It’s a major factor in deciding what doctors should do next for them.
…
The shortage issue centers on the supply chain for Tc-99m’s “parent” element, molybdenum-99, or Mo-99. Right now, it can only be made by processing uranium in a nuclear reactor or particle accelerator. One of those reactors – at Chalk River in Ontario, Canada – will shut in October.
A steady supply of Mo-99m, which has a half-life of about three days, is needed to make enough technetium to meet world demand. Because Tc-99m’s radioactive half-life is just six hours, it must be made from Mo-99 at or near the place where the heart patients get their stress tests. U-M’s own hospital receives a shipment once a week.
The U.S. and Russia are the only source of the highly enriched uranium currently used in to make Mo-99 at sites in Canada and western Europe. But U.S. nuclear policy calls for an end to shipments outside the country in a few years. Nuclear arms control efforts aimed at reducing the proliferation of materials which could be used in making weapons are complicated by regular shipments of highly-enriched uranium around the world.
…[/font][/font]
[font size=5]A nuclear threat to heart patients? U-M experts show impact from shortage of radioactive stress test tracer[/font]
[font size=4]As supply problems loom, study of 2010 shortage shows more risky and expensive tests got used when technetium-99m was in short supply[/font]
[font size=3]ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Nearly 15 million times a year, Americans with heart trouble climb onto a treadmill to take a stress test that can reveal blockages in their heart’s blood vessels. It’s a major factor in deciding what doctors should do next for them.
…
The shortage issue centers on the supply chain for Tc-99m’s “parent” element, molybdenum-99, or Mo-99. Right now, it can only be made by processing uranium in a nuclear reactor or particle accelerator. One of those reactors – at Chalk River in Ontario, Canada – will shut in October.
A steady supply of Mo-99m, which has a half-life of about three days, is needed to make enough technetium to meet world demand. Because Tc-99m’s radioactive half-life is just six hours, it must be made from Mo-99 at or near the place where the heart patients get their stress tests. U-M’s own hospital receives a shipment once a week.
The U.S. and Russia are the only source of the highly enriched uranium currently used in to make Mo-99 at sites in Canada and western Europe. But U.S. nuclear policy calls for an end to shipments outside the country in a few years. Nuclear arms control efforts aimed at reducing the proliferation of materials which could be used in making weapons are complicated by regular shipments of highly-enriched uranium around the world.
…[/font][/font]
