Estimated radiation dose in the thyroid and thyroid cancer risk attributed to head or chest CT scans for pediatric patients / 中华放射医学与防护杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To estimate the radiation dose and cancer risk of thyroid for children who underwent head CT or chest CT scans.Methods The parameters used in the CT scans were accessed from the DICOM files through PACS used DCMTK software, then the thyroid radiation dose was estimated with the CT-Expo(C) software and the cancer risk induced by CT scan was projected based on BEIR Ⅱ model combined with the Chinese cancer incidence and lifetime table in 2008.Results CT parameters used for different ages were roughly the same, the thyroid equivalent dose for head CT ranged from 1.2-2.0 mGy, the highest thyroid cancer risk occurs for newborn girls, about 9.6/100 thousand population;while for chest CT the thyroid equivalent dose ranged from 8.1 to 38.0 mGy, the highest thyroid cancer risk was also for newborn girls, about 244.7/100 thousand population.The radiation dose and cancer risk for thyroid decreased with the increased age.Conclusions The radiation dose for thyroid from chest CT was relatively higher than head CT, especially for newborn babies;therefore more protection should be given to the thyroid and other radio-sensitive organs during CT scanning.