West Boca Medical Center is among the few hospitals in south Florida to offer the DaTscan™, a new diagnostic imaging technique that allows physicians to differentiate Parkinson’s disease from other movement disorders. The DaTscan™ is the only FDA-approved imaging agent for assessment of movement disorders such as Parkinson’s Disease.
The DaTscan, developed by GE Healthcare, is a substance that detects dopamine transporters in the brain. A patient is injected with the contrast agent and then undergoes a specialized scan. The scan captures detailed pictures of the brain’s dopamine system and shows the presence of dopamine transporters. In patients with Parkinson’s Disease or another parkinsonian syndrome, the scans show extremely low dopamine levels.
