Precise intraoperative location of gastrointestinal bleeding with a hand-held counter. Work in progress.
The nuclear medicine bleeding scan is frequently insufficient to locate sites of bleeding precisely, in spite of its great sensitivity. A small, hand-held Geiger-Müller counter, placed directly on exposed intestine in the operating room, enables precise location of the probable bleeding site. In three patients, the technique allowed a minimal amount of intestine to be resected, distinguished between large- and small-intestinal hemorrhage, and eliminated other foci as sites of bleeding.
D006471:Gastrointestinal Hemorrhage / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D006801:Humans; D007430:Intraoperative Care; D011874:Radiometry; D011877:Radionuclide Imaging