A PET-CT (positron emission tomography) lab for diagnosing cancer has opened at the Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences (INMAS) beside Chattogram Medical College Hospital. Six patients were scanned on Wednesday, the first day of formal operation. Until now the test was not available anywhere in Chattogram, public or private, so patients had to go to Dhaka.
PET-CT shows where a cancer started and where in the body it has spread. People in the field say that without it, doctors in Chattogram often had to decide on radiotherapy or chemotherapy from several smaller tests. The scan costs about Tk 55,000 to Tk 60,000 at private hospitals in Dhaka; INMAS Chattogram says it can now be done at government rates for about half that.
The key ingredient of a PET-CT scan is a radioisotope made in a cyclotron, and only three places in the country have one: NINMAS on the BMU campus in Dhaka, INMAS Chattogram, and a corporate hospital in Dhaka. NINMAS, INMAS at Dhaka Medical College, the Atomic Energy Research Establishment at Savar and three private hospitals in Dhaka also offer the scan, but the others buy in their isotopes. Private hospitals in Chattogram will now be able to buy a PET-CT machine alone and use isotopes from the new cyclotron.
Specialists say X-ray, CT, ultrasound and MRI show a tumour's size, shape and position. In PET-CT, the PET part shows the tumour's metabolism and the CT part its structure; fused into one image, they show which cells are most active, and so whether a tumour is malignant or benign.
According to INMAS, the Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission took up a Tk 106 crore project in 2019-20 that built a six-storey building, a molecular lab and the PET-CT machine with its cyclotron.
INMAS Chattogram director Professor Pabitra Kumar Bhattacharjee said patients can now be scanned at the government's set price, for the time being from the morning to the end of office hours. Dr Ali Asgar Chowdhury, associate professor of clinical oncology and radiotherapy at Chattogram Medical College Hospital, called it good news for the region's cancer patients. The report is by Dainik Azadi's Zahedul Kabir.
Photo: liz west / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)
Source: Dainik Azadi
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