What are the benefits versus risks?
A.Because PET allows study of body function, it can help physicians detect alteration in biochemical processes that suggest disease before changes in anatomy are apparent.Because the radioactivity is very short-lived, your radiation exposure is extremely low. The substance amount is so small that is does not affect the normal processes of the body. If it did, the test results would be unreliable since your doctor would not be sure of whether biochemical changes in your body were the result of a disease or the presence of the radioactivity.The radioactive substance may expose the fetus of patients who are pregnant or the infants of women who are breast-feeding to the radiation. The risk to the fetus or infant should be considered related to the information gain from the potential results of the PET examination.
