Nuclear Medicine
 
Nuclear medicine provides doctors with information about both structure and function. It is a technique to gather medical information which would otherwise be difficult to obtain, require surgery, or necessitate more complicated, invasive & expensive diagnostic tests. Nuclear medicine tests often identify abnormalities long before symptoms become apparent.  
 
Nuclear medicine uses a tiny amount of radioactivity in radiopharmaceuticals to diagnose and treat diseases. In imaging, the radiopharmaceuticals are detected by special types of gamma cameras that work with computers to provide precise pictures about the area of the body being imaged. In treatment, the radiopharmaceuticals go directly to the organ being treated.

The amount of radiation delivered during a typical nuclear imaging procedure is comparable with diagnostic x-rays or for that matter, equivalent to cosmic radiation received during a return air trip to Europe. All care is taken to maintain radiation to as low as is resonably achievable.