How often does it happen? A review of unintended, unnecessary and unavoidable high-dose radiation exposures

High-dose radiation exposures of humans occur every year around the world, and may lead to harmful
tissue reactions. This review aims to look at the available information sources that can help
answering the question of how often these events occur yearly on a global scale. In the absence of
comprehensive databases of global occurrence, publications on radiation accidents in all uses of
radiation and on rates of high-dose events in different medical uses of radiation have been
reviewed. Most high-dose radiation exposures seem to occur in the medical uses of radiation,
reflecting the high number of medical exposures performed. In therapeutic medical uses, radiation
doses are purposely often given at levels known to cause deterministic effects, and there is a very
narrow range in which the medical practitioner can operate without causing severe unacceptable
outcomes. In interventional medical uses, there are scenarios in which the radiation dose given to a
patient may reach or exce...

Source: Journal of Radiological Protection - December 6, 2021 Category: Physics Authors: Ola Holmberg and Miroslav Pinak Source Type: research