TORONTO - A new report says the shortage of medical isotopes caused by the shutdown of the Chalk River reactor had a sizable impact on medical facilities and patients.
The report says there was roughly a 22 per cent decrease in tests done last October compared to the previous year, meaning about 12,000 fewer exams were conducted.
And the testing that was still done cost most facilities more money.
In a survey of facilities, about two-thirds reported they went over budget for isotope purchases due to surcharges imposed by vendors.
Researchers looked at numbers of bone, heart and lung tests done at three time points: in February 2009, three months before the Chalk River shutdown began; in August, when a second leading reactor in the Netherlands was also down; and in October.
The survey of facilities that use medical isotopes was conducted by the Canadian Institute for Health Information.
Two-thirds of Canadian sites doing nuclear medicine completed the survey. Among them, they did about 75 per cent of all nuclear medicine tests in Canada last year.
There was a slight dip in tests done in February, shortly before the May shutdown. But there was a greater one that followed.
In August, with Chalk River and the Petten reactor in the Netherlands closed, lung and bone exams were down 18 per cent and heart tests were down 25 per cent from the previous year.
In October, Petten was reopened, but Chalk River was still closed. When compared to the previous year, lung exams were down 16 per cent and bone and cardiac care tests were down 22 per cent in Canada, the report shows.
Facilities coped by reorganizing priority lists for testing and re-scheduling procedures to optimize available isotopes.
Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. filed an application last Friday for a formal hearing to get permission to reopen the Chalk River facility in late July. The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission said it would expedite the application.
