Radiation Exposure from Medical Tests - A Cause for Concern

While cell phones and microwaves are often seen as the prime source of urban radiation, a new report suggests that Americans are most exposed to radiation from medical tests. Though medical procedures that use radiation are widespread among the developed countries, more than half of the total procedures are used in the US where radiation exposure has grown by more than 6 times in the last two decades.

There are no existing rules that limit the number of such tests that a patient could take in a given period of time though the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is now undertaking steps to develop a "radiation medical record" that will show the patients how much radiation they are exposed to.

Says Sean Boyd, chief of the FDA's diagnostic devices branch, “We are considering requirements and guidelines for record-keeping of dose and other technical parameters of the imaging exam.”


Source-Medindia