- CUTLINE: Members of The Bellevue Hospital’s Nuclear Medicine Department include, front row left to right, Kelly Morrow, CNMT, BS, and Catherine Ackerman, RT. In the back are Radiologist Steven Zieber, M.D., and Marc Schoen, Diagnostic Imaging Department
The Bellevue Hospital’s (TBH) Nuclear Medicine program has been granted a three-year term of accreditation in Nuclear Medicine by the Intersocietal Commission for the Accreditation of Nuclear Medicine Laboratories (ICANL). This is the first-ever accreditation for TBH’s Nuclear Medicine Department through the ICANL.
“The staff in our Nuclear Medicine Department has worked very hard to achieve this recognition. Our patients are treated by Nuclear Medicine Technologists and Physicians who are highly qualified in their fields, and we are very proud of all of them for this achievement,” noted Janet Runner, Vice President for Patient Care Services at TBH. “This is just another example of the high quality of care that we offer our patients, close to home.”
Nuclear medicine is a medical specialty that is used to diagnose and treat diseases in a safe and painless way. It is a specialized area of Diagnostic Imaging that uses very small amounts of radioactive materials, or radiopharmaceuticals, to examine organ function and structure. The procedures often identify abnormalities very early in the progression of disease — long before some medical problems are apparent with other diagnostic tests. This early detection allows a disease to be treated sooner in its course when a more successful prognosis may be possible.
Accreditation by the ICANL means that TBH has undergone a thorough review of its operational and technical components by a panel of experts. The ICANL grants accreditation only to those facilities that are found to be providing quality patient care, in compliance with national standards through a comprehensive application process including detailed case study review.
ICANL accreditation is a “seal of approval” that patients can rely on as an indication that the facility has been carefully critiqued on all aspects of it operations considered relevant by medical experts in the field of nuclear medicine.
Patients are encouraged to inquire as to the accreditation status of the facility where their examination will be performed and can learn more by visiting http://www.qualitymedicaltesting.org/index.htm
For additional information on Nuclear Medicine or other diagnostic imaging services at TBH, contact department leader Marc Schoen, at 419.483.4040, Ext. 4293.