Nuclear Cardiology: Frequently Asked Questions

Nuclear Cardiology is a specialty of cardiology that uses radioisotopes for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes.

Your doctor has ordered a cardiac stress test. The test will be done through the Nuclear Medicine Department. It is a two-part scan that will show if there are areas of the heart muscle that may not be getting enough blood either at rest or during stress or exercise. Depending on the test your doctor ordered, you will either be walking on the treadmill or you will get a medication to increase the blood flow to the heart. ...

Nuclear cardiology studies are procedures in which a small amount of radioactive material is used to assess myocardial blood flow, evaluate the pumping function of the heart and visualize the size and location of a heart attack.

Nuclear medicine or nuclear cardiology scans (for example, positron emission tomography, or PET) use a radioactive isotope to trace the activity or inactivity of the cells in a body. It can detect damaged or nonfunctioning areas and is particularly good at showing the brain, at examining cancer cell activity or showing damaged parts of organs (such as the heart).

Nuclear scans are done in two circumstances: [1] to determine if heart artery blockages are present (coronary artery disease) in patients who have developed symptoms that suggest the possibility of heart trouble, such as chest pressure, or burning, or who are at significant risk of heart trouble (persons with diabetes or high cholesterol, for example), or [2] among patients with known heart trouble to determine their risk of an event in the future. ...

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Cardiac PET (Positron Emission Tomography) is actually a type of nuclear test of the heart. There are several methods and techniques for imaging the heart with nuclear technology. PET is one of them. Depending on the clinical question asked, a particular imaging modality, or type of test, would be preferred. PET scans are sometimes performed in patients with markedly weakened hearts.

As described in ASNC's training document titled The Knowledge Base for Nuclear Cardiology Training, the basic principles underlying the field of nuclear cardiology were described in the 1920s, but the clinical development and widespread use of these techniques did not take place until the mid-1970s. Since that time, it has become one of the older and most established technologies to image the heart. ...

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