Nuclear medicine in Vietnam

Despite the presence of many bright Vietnamese nuclear medicine physicians and scientists, the level of clinical practice languishes seriously behind that of Europe, the United States, Japan and most other parts of the world. This is directly attributable to the country's severe poverty, which places serious constraints on the number of available pieces of functioning imaging equipment, the ability to service equipment and establish appropriate quality assurance and preventative maintenance programs and the ability to purchase adequate radiopharmaceuticals to serve their patients' needs. At this time, the Vietnamese nuclear medicine community is anxious to enhance its contact with colleagues throughout the world. They need and welcome help in obtaining instrumentation, in vivo and in vitro diagnostic kits and educational aids from outside agencies, commercial countries and medical centers that are able to assist them. They would be most appreciative to receive and encourage visits from professional colleagues who would be able to provide lectures, seminars, books, journals and other teaching tools that would contribute to the upgrading of their clinical practice of nuclear medicine.