Ionizing Radiation Therapy
Medical imaging has led to improvements in the diagnosis and treatment of numerous medical conditions in children and adults.
There are many types - or modalities - of medical imaging procedures, each of which uses different technologies and techniques. Computed tomography (CT), fluoroscopy, and radiography ("conventional X-ray" including mammography) all use ionizing radiation to generate images of the body. Ionizing radiation is a form of radiation that has enough energy to potentially cause damage to DNA and may elevate a person’s lifetime risk of developing cancer.
CT, radiography, and fluoroscopy all work on the same basic principle: an X-ray beam is passed through the body where a portion of the X-rays are either absorbed or scattered …show more content…
Ionizing radiation is a form of radiation that has enough energy to potentially cause damage to DNA. Risks from exposure to ionizing radiation include: a small increase in the possibility that a person exposed to X-rays will develop cancer later in life. (General information for patients and health care providers on cancer detection and treatment is available from the National Cancer Institute.) tissue effects such as cataracts, skin reddening, and hair loss, which occur at relatively high levels of radiation exposure and are rare for many types of imaging exams. For example, the typical use of a CT scanner or conventional radiography equipment should not result in tissue effects, but the dose to the skin from some long, complex interventional fluoroscopy procedures might, in some circumstances, be high enough to result in such effects.
Another risk of X-ray imaging is possible reactions associated with an intravenously injected contrast agent, or “dye”, that is sometimes used to improve …show more content…
patient’s age - The lifetime risk of cancer is larger for a patient who receives X-rays at a younger age than for one who receives them at an older age. patient’s sex - Women are at a somewhat higher lifetime risk than men for developing radiation-associated cancer after receiving the same exposures at the same ages. body region - Some organs are more radiosensitive than
There are many types - or modalities - of medical imaging procedures, each of which uses different technologies and techniques. Computed tomography (CT), fluoroscopy, and radiography ("conventional X-ray" including mammography) all use ionizing radiation to generate images of the body. Ionizing radiation is a form of radiation that has enough energy to potentially cause damage to DNA and may elevate a person’s lifetime risk of developing cancer.
CT, radiography, and fluoroscopy all work on the same basic principle: an X-ray beam is passed through the body where a portion of the X-rays are either absorbed or scattered …show more content…
Ionizing radiation is a form of radiation that has enough energy to potentially cause damage to DNA. Risks from exposure to ionizing radiation include: a small increase in the possibility that a person exposed to X-rays will develop cancer later in life. (General information for patients and health care providers on cancer detection and treatment is available from the National Cancer Institute.) tissue effects such as cataracts, skin reddening, and hair loss, which occur at relatively high levels of radiation exposure and are rare for many types of imaging exams. For example, the typical use of a CT scanner or conventional radiography equipment should not result in tissue effects, but the dose to the skin from some long, complex interventional fluoroscopy procedures might, in some circumstances, be high enough to result in such effects.
Another risk of X-ray imaging is possible reactions associated with an intravenously injected contrast agent, or “dye”, that is sometimes used to improve …show more content…
patient’s age - The lifetime risk of cancer is larger for a patient who receives X-rays at a younger age than for one who receives them at an older age. patient’s sex - Women are at a somewhat higher lifetime risk than men for developing radiation-associated cancer after receiving the same exposures at the same ages. body region - Some organs are more radiosensitive than