Garbage and RAI

[Guest guest]

On the question about how long to hold onto your

garbage after RAI: This might be one of those cases

where the rules vary depending on where you live.

Where I live, Oregon, the landfills have radiation

detectors and so I got detailed instructions about

post-RAI garbage. The nuclear med tech said to

separate out anything that gets my body fluids on it,

like napkins, plastic eating utensils, tampons, etc.

She said not to eat ribs, corn on the cob, fried

chicken or anything else like that because I would

have to keep the bones and cobs, too. I had to keep

all this trash in blue (for medical waste) bags for

two weeks after getting home from the hospital.

I just finished the two weeks. Now the blue bags are

in the garage, where they are supposed to stay for

three months. Then I can put them out with the regular

trash.

The tech said she is very careful about this ever

since she sent home another patient who celebrated the

end of her RAI by eating fried chicken. The patient

threw all the bones in her trash, which set off the

radiation detector at the landfill. The folks there

traced the trash back to the patient, and from her to

the hospital. The tech then had to go down to the

landfill and clean up the chicken bones herself.

Would like to hear more about what others were told to

do...wondering if other states are more lax or Oregon

is hyper-paranoid...

Amy in Portland, OR

pap thyca, 147 mCi 8/28/2002

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