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Abstract
Iodine-131 is a radioactive isotope that is routinely administered as sodium iodide-131 (NaI-131) by health-care providers to both diagnose and treat thyroid disease. Patients may receive between 1 Ci and 10 mCi for diagnostic procedures. Therapeutically, patients may be administered 1 to 300 mCi depending on whether they are being treated for hyperthyroidism (1 to 29 mCi) or thyroid cancer (30 to 300 mCi) [1, 2]. The mechanism by which radioiodine (RI) is taken up into the thyroid depends on a number of factors, including the functional status of the gland, the level of thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) in the blood, and the consumption of certain foods and medications. As RI undergoes radioactive decay by releasing energy in the form of gamma and beta radiation, safety precautions should be followed by those receiving RI to keep potential secondary exposures to the public well within regulatory limits [4]. Health-care professionals who assist in the administration of RI to a patient, such as the prescribing physician and nuclear medicine technologist, usually provide safety instructions to the patient prior to RI administration and again before discharge from the clinic or hospital. These instructions include the minimum distance at which the patient should stand from others, instructions on washing clothes, and instructions on toilet use.