Nuclear medicine produced by the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) will quietly play an important role in ensuring that Australia's top thoroughbreds bring their jockeys safely to the winning post this racing season.
Like human athletes, horses suffer from a wide variety of stress fractures to the bones, but for horses and their riders, this damage can have far more serious consequences. To accurately diagnose potential problems of this sort, thoroughbred trainers are now applying the same technology used by humans on their charges. The key to this is the gamma camera - commonly used by humans in nuclear medicine facilities around Australia - and the nuclear medicine produced by ANSTO's HIFAR research reactor.
Horses are injected with a mixture of an ANSTO-produced radioactive isotope Technetium-99 and HDP, or Hydroxy Diphosphonate. Technetium-99 carries the HDP directly to the surface of the bone through the muscle and ligament layers.
The isotope gives off small amounts of rapidly dissipating radiation - enough for the gamma camera to take a snapshot of the bone so that the horse's health can then be analysed.
This procedure, sometimes know on as nuclear scintigraphy, is ideal for diagnosing stress fractures of the long bones, as well as the pelvis, osteoarthritis, and tendon and ligament injuries. All of these conditions can be difficult or impossible to identify with other methods such as X-ray or ultrasound. As with humans, the advantage of this technology is that doctors are able to get a much fuller picture of physiological function, rather than just structure.
A number of Melbourne Cup winners, such as Saintly and Doreimus have benefited from the procedure, which is also gaining rapid acceptance for use on horses in a range of other fields such as dressage, event and jumping races.