Final answer:
Specialty departments in hospitals that use ionizing radiation include Nuclear Medicine, Radiology, and Radiation Oncology, where they provide diagnostic and therapeutic services such as X-ray, CT scans, PET scans, and radiotherapy, primarily for cancer treatment.
Step-by-step explanation:
Specialty departments in hospitals that use ionizing radiation serve various purposes in medical diagnosis and treatment. The main departments include:
- Nuclear Medicine
- Radiology
- Radiation Oncology
These departments utilize procedures such as X-rays, CT (Computed Tomography) scans, PET (Positron Emission Tomography) scans, and isotopic studies, which are critical in offering diagnostic and therapeutic services. For instance, nuclear medicine involves the use of radiopharmaceuticals to locate and study diseased tissue, monitor organ function, and identify conditions such as cancer cells in bones or brain tumors. Notably, radiation therapy, or radiotherapy, is a common treatment used almost exclusively for cancer therapy, where it employs high-energy radiation to kill cancer cells by damaging their DNA.
However, it is important to distinguish that not all imaging departments utilize ionizing radiation. For example, MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) and ultrasound departments do not use ionizing forms of radiation and instead rely on magnetic fields and sound waves, respectively. Ionizing radiation in medical applications must be carefully managed due to its potential to both cure and cause harm, including cancer, through the manipulation of DNA molecules. The radiation doses are measured in units such as radiation dose unit (rad), relative biological effectiveness (RBE), and the roentgen equivalent man (rem) to ensure patient safety.