“Is it safe to be working in nuclear medicine with the coronavirus?”

Everything is relative. There is risk to being exposed to the public in general when there is an epidemic, especially one spread through droplets or aerosol. People working in the medical field in general have increased risk; however, the risk is greater for repeated or close exposures such as medical personnel involved in resuscitation or ventilation procedures. Most nuclear departments do not do ventilation procedures during the COVID-19 epidemic, which decreases risk to Nuclear technologists. I have about 10 people working for me, and all but one of them got confirmed COVID-19 at some point during the epidemic, but to the best of our knowledge, none of them contracted it in our clinic or nuclear lab and neither did I myself. All of them got it through exposure at home or traveling. This is typical of COVID-19 experience in general, which is primarily through spread from close personal contacts rather than infrequent or limited contacts on the job. There are exceptions to this comment: people who work on a COVID-19 ward or in Emergency Rooms are often infected. Bottom line: there is widespread risk of COVID-19 exposure during any COVID-19 epidemic; however, unless there are unusual circumstances, you are probably safer at your nuclear medicine job than with usual, nonquarantined affairs of daily living at home. When effective vaccines or other therapies such as monoclonal antibodies and antiviral antibiotics are available, they also decrease risks; however, vaccine and other therapy efficacy varies (usually decreases) as new viral strains evolve.

If you are an asymptomatic carrier, you must NOT WORK in a hospital, but self-quarantine at once. You can give the disease to someone over 80 where up to 14% die!!!

Edward B. Silberstein, M.A., M.D.

We are exposed to sick patients. However there is significant screening before a patient is sent for a nuclear medicine study. When necessary we can put on protective clothing.