Intersindical Canaria urges the Canary Health Service to install in the Doctor Negrín Hospital of Gran Canaria and in the University Hospital of the Canary Islands, two cyclotrons, planned since 2020, for oncological diagnosis and treatment.
The union has thus asked this Friday in a statement to the regional Administration to "proceed, without further delay, to the acquisition and installation of, at least, those two cyclotrons, and the corresponding production units as they are key in the treatment and oncological diagnosis and collaborate greatly to save lives".
The organization has explained that positron emission tomography (PET) is an imaging technique that has experienced great growth in recent years and is considered a basic tool of great radiological diagnostic utility in the field of oncology, and also in the field of neurology and cardiology.
It recalls that in 2021 the PET was installed in the Nuestra Señora de La Candelaria University Hospital, although it denounces that "the realization of this test has been suffering repeated delays in the programming, even suspensions, with very important damages for the patients" for whom these treatments are "vital".
"The waiting lists for the realization of the PET are lengthened, and even, it is chosen to reevaluate and realize a screening of those lists to select only the patients that, to medical judgment, more can need it", it refers.
According to IC, "the repeated problems and delays that are taking place in the realization of this type of tests have to do with the difficulties to have radiopharmaceuticals or radioisotopes, an indispensable compound to realize the PET and that is manufactured in Madrid, by means of the cyclotron that Canary lacks".
The union warns that the radiopharmaceutical, "besides being unstable, has a short life of effectiveness, decaying its effectiveness after two hours, reason why its punctual and maintained reception from Madrid to Canary, as it is happening, can be suspended or be useless, before any mishap".
