RADIUM’S CHILD

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 54, 28 November 1923, Page 13

RADIUM’S CHILD

EMANATION VOLUME I “STRICT RATIO TO PARENT SALT” Two of the maim points of i trial interest in the Radium Appeal (Radiation) Appeal are these : — (1) In those eases in which the patient has to go to the radiation treatment, it is better for a country dweller in tho middle belt of New Zealand to go to a Radium Department at Wellington Hospital than to go all the way to Dunedin. (2) In those cases in which the radiation treatment has to be sent to the patient, this can only be done through the use of radium enianaion, and the supplying of emanation requires the purchase of a very considerable amount of radium to be kept at the Radium Department. In support of the latter statement, a summary of conclusions stated in “The Radium Therapist” is convincing The “Therapist” states that the employment or radium emanation as a therapeutic agent is steadily in-, creasing, and its field of usefulness broadens from day to day, as its merits and advantages become more widely recognised. The manipulation of the emanation is a highly technical process, and necessitates the attention and services of a staff of specially trained physicists, whose measurements of its initial radioactivity and its subsequent variations can be relied on absolutely. How Emanation Decays There is, further, the fact that the emanation can only be obtained from solutions of radium salts; tho quantity is limited, and bears a strict ratio to the amount of the patent salt. A gramme of radium bromide in solution will furnish a daily output of radium emanation possessing a ra-dio-activity equivalent to that of 150 milligrammes (three-twentieths or .15 of a gramme) of radium bromide. This emanation slo.wly decays, its initial radio-activity being reduced to onehalf in 3.85 days, and to one-fifth in 8.8 days. During the first twentyfour' hours the loss is exactly 16 per cent. (2 per cent, every three hours). This rate of decay never varies, and it is thus a perfectly simple matter io prepare an apparatus the mean activity of which during a pericd of twenty-four hours would be exactly equivalent to that of a radium salt apparatus of a stated strength. Radium has been quoted to the Wellington Hospital Board at £16.000 per gramme (including emanation outfit, etc-). Therefore, as the amount of emanation depends upon the amount of radium, it is obvious, that every town cannot have a sufficient quality of radium, and that to equip the Radium Department at Welhngon Hospital with sufficient radium to distribute emanation will need a liberal subscription by people in the country as well as people in the city “It is obvious,” says “The Radium Therapist,” ‘'that the handling of radium emanation in a really adequate manner can only bo undertaken at hospitals or institutions which are in a position to incur a very large capital charge in acquiring the requisite amount of radium salt; and on this account, unless the price of radium falls very considerably, it appears highly probable that emanation work will for a long time bo limited almost exclusively to those institutions which already have a large amount of radium, and a specially trained staff.”

Not For Small Units of population.

The cost of providing enough i.-dium to supply sufficient emanation, and the cost of providing a modern apparatus for .deep X-Ray therapy, make it certain that at present radiation is not a treatment adaptable to small units of population. The country districts’ best 'chance of securing emanation is through the proposed J’edium Department at Wellington Hospital, and the purchase for that department of a substantial amount cf radiiim, part (if it in solution (to provide emanation) and part of it as radium salt.

The Radium (Radiation) Appeal is for £lO,OOO (net) with which Qins Government subsidy), it is hoped to establish at 'Wellington Hospital a radium department, where radiation treatment (Radium and X-rays) will be carried on, and from which radium emanation may be distributed ever a wide area of country. The appeal is backed by the British Medical Association. _ The appeal district is tho Middle belt of the North Island, founded on the north by a lino from New Payments to Napier via Taumai-iinui (inclusive of these towns), on the south by the southern boundaries of Marlborough and Nelson provinces. The secretary of the General < ommittee is Mr. G. Mitchell, whose office is in the Exchange Buildings, Dominion Avenue, off Txmbton Quay. Sul scriptions may bo sent to Mr Mitchell or to tho Mayor of Wellington, and country subscribers have the alternative course of paying to any local accredited agency.