increased cancer risk with cardiac imaging

[eric593]

http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/Health/201102 ... on-110207/

Hope this doesn't apply to us too.

[gibbledygook]

CT scanning and anything using Xray technology like the venograms will increase our risk of cancer. Sorry.

[sou]

So does immune suppression.

[HappyPoet]

There are a couple old threads here that discuss how one session of CT venography is equal to the exposure of approximately 100 X-rays. Sorry.

[Nasti]

There was somewhere an info that MSers contract other diseases more rarely than other people because they watch out for their eating habits, stress etc. So this might counteract. A bit.
Finally, in my country there is a saying that lightning doesn't strike twice in the same place. Though if it already stroke once...

[gibbledygook]

All the more reason to eat plenty of turmeric or take curcumin supplements.

[NHE]

There are a couple old threads here that discuss how one session of CT venography is equal to the exposure of approximately 100 X-rays. Sorry.

Here's Dr. Sclafani's post...

http://www.thisisms.com/ftopicp-113211.html#113211

the dose of an angiogram of the neck and chest generates about 5 millisievert, (mSy) which is a definition of dose absorbed.

Lets put that in perspective. The dose is about the same as 170 chest xrays. A head CT scan is 2 mSy, a chest CT 8mSy. Annual allowable occupation dose limit is 50 mSy. the LD50 is 5000 Sy.

NHE

[eric593]

There are a couple old threads here that discuss how one session of CT venography is equal to the exposure of approximately 100 X-rays. Sorry.

Here's Dr. Sclafani's post...

http://www.thisisms.com/ftopicp-113211.html#113211

the dose of an angiogram of the neck and chest generates about 5 millisievert, (mSy) which is a definition of dose absorbed.

Lets put that in perspective. The dose is about the same as 170 chest xrays. A head CT scan is 2 mSy, a chest CT 8mSy. Annual allowable occupation dose limit is 50 mSy. the LD50 is 5000 Sy.

NHE

Thanks.

Looks like it might be more toxic than previously thought and perhaps something to keep in mind in terms of considering repeat procedures over short periods of time. The cancer risks would rise considerably.

Something to definitely think about and take into consideration, for sure. We might not want to be considering venograms as routine, regular occurences of a couple procedures a year for an indefinite period as the risks of cancer would rise significantly.

Heart attack survivors who undergo scans and nuclear medicine tests tend to have higher rates of cancer than those with less exposure, a new Canadian study suggests.

The researchers, from the McGill University Health Centre and the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal, note that the use of cardiac imaging tests has exploded in recent years in both Canada and the U.S.

And yet, they point out, little attention has been paid to the cumulative effect of the radiation used in those tests, or on how they might be affecting cancer rates.

So for this study, which appears in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, the researchers looked almost 83,000 patients who had a heart attack between 1996 and 2006, but who had no history of cancer.

About 77 per cent underwent at least one cardiac procedure using low-dose ionizing radiation within a year of the attack.

The tests included a heart imaging test called myocardial perfusion imaging, angiogram procedures called diagnostic cardiac catheterization and percutaneous coronary intervention, as well as a form of nuclear imaging called cardiac resting ventriculography All the tests involve exposing patients to low-dose ionizing radiation.

While most patients received only a low or moderate level of radiation, a substantial group were exposed to high levels through repeated tests -- and these patients tended to be younger, healthy men.

The study's lead author, Dr. Louise Pilote, a researcher in epidemiology, says her team found a distinct link between the cumulative exposure to low-dose ionizing radiation from cardiac imaging and the risk of cancer.

Over the course of the study, the researchers found 12,000 incidents of cancers, with two-thirds of the cancers affecting the abdomen/pelvis and chest areas.

They calculated that for every 10 "milliSieverts" of ionizing radiation, there was a 3.0 per cent increase in the risk of cancer, the study found. (A milliSievert is commonly used to measure the radiation dose in diagnostic medical procedures.)

Since the risk for cancer grows with age, the researchers accounted for that in their calculations.

"These results call into question whether our current enthusiasm for imaging and therapeutic procedures after acute myocardial infarction should be tempered," she and her co-authors conclude.

[HappyPoet]

So does immune suppression.

My Novantrone chemo treatments for MS (reached my lifetime limit) came with a whopping 10% chance of future cancer, plus it damages hearts and causes chemo-brain (similar to MS cogfog).

[AlmostClever]

In all honesty, I don't think it's the cancer that's gonna get me!

I don't worry about those things.

Who was it that said "Nobody gets out alive" anyways?

A/C

[dreddk]

Cancer Risk From Cardiac CT Overstated, Researchers Say

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 112146.htm

There is also a recent study that concludes that radiographers have lower cancer rates due to regular radiation exposure which may have a beneficial effect. I can't locate it but here's one with the same conclusion

http://bjr.birjournals.org/cgi/content/full/75/895/637

[L]

There are a few supplements that you can take which may reduce the risk perhaps. I bought every one before the procedure, hedging my bets.

I know that coenzyme Q10 was recommended on a page (which I can't find now but looked quite well informed) and vitamin A. I shall look out the others tomorrow. Fresh miso was recommended too which I eat every day anyway.

Well, who knows if they do any good at all? I find it everso slightly reassuring to be do something though..

[muse]

Dr. J. Hewett http://www.pacificinterventional.com/physicians.html : “……In the question and answer period, Dr. Hewett stressed that we should get the fluoro time from our treatment doctors because of the potential radiation exposure. This time indicates how long we were exposed to the dye used during the procedure to assess blood flow. In the United States and Canada, it is the law to keep this time very short. Dr. Code mentioned one patient who had CCSVI treatment and had two hours of radiation exposure during the procedure, leading to all of her hair falling out. Dr. Hewett said this couldn't happen in the US or Canada because of the regulations. He didn't think patients need to be overly concerned about repeated angioplasties (meaning repeated exposure to this dye), mentioning that we probably are exposed to more radiation coming out of building materials used in our homes; however, it is important to keep this information in our medical records…..”

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