What are your thoughts on this?

[MisterGobbles]

Yeah, lame thread title, I know.

Anyway, my mom was telling me about her co-worker/semi-boss, and what she recently did. She has a type of thyroid cancer, and she is having it treated by taking a radiation pill. After taking this pill, she has to be quarantined in a lead room (in her own house) for a few days to let the radiation wear off so she is not harmful to other people.

So apparently, she called my mom yesterday, and she was in RadioShack, buying a phone to replace her cellphone's dead battery, which she probably killed with her radiation, since she has no landline. This woman was IN PUBLIC, IN AN ELECTRONICS STORE, AND SHE WAS RADIOACTIVE.

Anyone else think this is a little selfish/dangerous? I can understand being worried about not having a phone in your house, but you could at least try asking a neighbor to use their phone or something to contact someone who could do that for her (and yes, she does have a boyfriend/other friends who could do something like that).

EDIT: To clarify, she is staying in a room that they have converted at her own house, and they apparently trust her to leave at her own will when the number of days had passed.

 

[Xpwn3ntial]

Who let her out of the lead room?

 

[tzimize]

And here I thought this was going to be a discussion on the word "this". Color me disappointed.

OT: There are radiation pills? Holy shit, I just need to feed it to a spider, make it pissed off at me and I'm all set!!!

 

[EdwardOrchard]

If it was something so serious that she'd need to be quarantined for fear of causing harm to the public, they probably wouldn't have released her to the public...

 

[Phishfood]

This smacks of hyperbole to me. If said pill was a hefty gamma source and dangerous it would kill the patient first.

If its an alpha source its not dangerous to anyone BUT the patient. Seriously, if something is safe enough to swallow its safe to be near the person that swallowed it.

 

[Gladiateher]

I have no idea what your talking about with this radiation pill thing, but yeah i think this woman is a totally selfish *****. If I knew her I would do anything I could to phase her out of my life as quickly as possible.

 

[Chefodeath]

This smacks of hyperbole to me. If said pill was a hefty gamma source and dangerous it would kill the patient first.

If its an alpha source its not dangerous to anyone BUT the patient. Seriously, if something is safe enough to swallow its safe to be near the person that swallowed it.

Pretty much this, and even assuming she was a walking bowl of radiation, I think the only people she'd be a risk to were people whom she maintained close contact to over long periods of time, not just some dude or another in the store.

 

[ZiggyE]

If anything could harm a human from a small amount of exposure in an open area due to radiation poisoning it'd be insanely dangerous to the 'patient'.

Also, this is all irrelevant as they don't treat Thyroid cancer by radiation pills.

 

[Prince Regent]

This is a link to what you mean: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodine-131#Medical_and_pharmaceutical_uses

Quite interesting to be honest, I didn't know such a thing existed. Anyway acording to Wikipedia hospital rules on this vary. Most advice not to have sex for a month and not to become pregnant for 6 months. Some hospitals also advice not to hug small children and a one or two metre distance to others may be recommended.

It decays with a half-life of 8.02 days with 90% beta and 10% gamma emissions. So it depends on how long ago she took the treatment.

It doesn't say anything about a lead room however. Are you sure about that? It sounds somewhat implausible.

 

[Eisenfaust]

i doubt it's that radioactive... it seems odd to use radiation with that long a half life, with radiation that permeable... it's possible, i suppose, but unlikely... radiation kills the immune system too, so her being out in public makes her at high risk of infection, and getting screwed over by the simplest bugs

essentially, i doubt it'd be strong enough to have any real detectable effect on anyone she happens to walk past in public. if it is, she'll get a cold and die soon enough and that'll stop her exposing people at the very least

 

[Rayne870]

Radiation usually sounds a butt ton worse than it is. If she was a serious harm to the public she would have died from the radiation by now. Her being in radio shack for a few minutes is not going to cause people she will most likely never see again to be sterile or have deformed children.

There's a lot of stuff missing from the story that makes it too easy to dismiss as trolling or a boss that likes to bullshit as well. A lead, radiation sealed room inside her house would be INSANELY expensive.

 

[Merkavar]

if she is that radio active and went out in public she should be fined or jailed. the reason she went out side is so small and unimportant.

if she is that radioactive that sh needs a lead room she could have harmed everyone she walked past when she went outside

 

[King of the Sandbox]

She has a lead-lined room? Who is this chick, Lex Luthor?

 

[TacticalAssassin1]

Nope. No way. There's no way they built a lead room and then just trusted her 'not to leave until it's safe, mkay?'
As for the radioactive pill thing? Sure, plausible. But the lead room thing? Pics or it didn't happen.

 

[Scabadus]

A lead-lined room? In her own house? Really? Not that that would be totally impracticle to build (not to mention expensive), requiring you to take apart the walls of your house and add extra supports in the foundations.

I know of the pill used, it's not used to treat cancer but rather identify it; it's been a while since I studied the topic so I can't go into great detail, but after a few days of being in the body's metabolism the radiation will pool in certain areas, highly radioactive areas are either tumors or the bladder. Guess which you want removed and which you reallydon't.

It's recomended that you're not extensivly around children for a week or so after taking the pill, but even that's mostly just a 'think of the kids' reaction. Being around adults, especially out doors in a breeze and fresh air, will do no harm to them. The body's pretty good with dealing with radiation you know, evidenced not least by the woman not being dead from the radioactive material inside her. Really, it won't do her harm while in her bloodstream, it isn't going to affect anyone she dares get close to.

Oh and as a side note, the universe itself is radioactive. It's called something like 'Two Degree Black Space Background Radiation' and is always present, no matter where you are, no matter how many lead sheets you encase yourself in. Humans are pretty used to the stuff.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

Hmm, interesting query.

As far as I understand it, the pronoun 'this' (plural 'these') is most commonly used to indentify a specific person or object close at hand, or something being indicated or experienced by the speaker. It can also be used to refer to specific items or objects mentioned previously in conversation.

This wide variety of uses and applications means that it's importance in modern English is ... ...

Aaw, just read the OP.

Err, if she's (radioactively) dangerous to anyone it's herself? Yeah, that.

 

[GrizzlerBorno]

Wouldn't you get Lead poisoning if you stayed in a room made entirely out of Lead? Combine that with having to take pills radioactive enough to warrant a quarantine, you'd think someone was out to assassinate this woman in the most obtuse way possible.....

Also, that should be a game. And I don't mean Bulletstorm.....

 

[Eldarion]

I think your mom is full of it. She must have heard wrong or something.

No way the patient had a lead lined room in her own house.

 

[tharglet]

Yeah, for doing thyroid scans they give you radioactive iodine so it appears on scans.

Not heard of people being in quarantine from it though. But the exposure to other people would be pretty limited unless she spends a whole bunch of time with someone.

As a random member of the public, it's not going to increase my radiation exposure by much.

 

[tharglet]

Wouldn't you get Lead poisoning if you stayed in a room made entirely out of Lead?

Only if you're thinking of licking and/or hugging the walls...

(I actually accidentally briefly chewed a piece of metal with lead in.... didn't do anything lol)