Emergency management of the individuals potentially contaminated by radioactive material and management of the hospitalization path

Abstract

The organization that has to face the radiological emergencies in a nuclear disaster or terroristic attack must be carefully planned. In the hospitals with a level one Emergency Department, it is possible to draw a pathway for the contaminated patients, based on internal resources and on the recommendations of the nuclear medicine associations (as AIMN – Associazione Italiana di Medicina Nucleare; SNM – Society of Nuclear Medicine). The “Santi Antonio e Biagio e Cesare Arrigo” hospital in Alessandria is a modern hospital and is the reference of an extended area, for its many highly specialized departments. In this background, and in a hospital with a level one Emergency Department, there are three qualified departments, able to play a primary role in the emergency management of the individuals potentially contaminated by nuclear materials: Emergency Department, Nuclear Medicine Unit and Health Physics Unit. Therefore the Alessandria Hospital is suitable to admit patients potentially contaminated by radioactive material, to determ i n e the level of contamination, to decontaminate them in the emergency decontamination area, to hospitalise and treat them in the nuclear medicine rooms