Gastric emptying studies

Gastric emptying studies

These are useful in the study of gastric dysmotility problems, particularly those that follow gastric surgery . The principle is that a radioisotope-labelled liquid and solid meal is ingested by the patient and emptying of the stomach is followed on a gamma camera. This allows the proportion of activity in the remaining stomach to be assessed. It is possible to follow liquid and solid gastric emptying independently ( Figure 67.8 ).