Health effects of medical radiation on cardiologists who perform cardiac catheterization.
BACKGROUND
We investigated the health effects of low-dose radiation on cardiologists exposed to scattered radiation while performing cardiac catheterization (CC) in a hospital setting from 2003 to 2006.


METHODS
We performed a 4-year retrospective study on 2, 292 medical doctors, using claims data from all contracted hospitals of the Bureau of National Health Insurance, Taiwan. We gathered statistical data regarding radiation-related diseases using the International Classification of Diseases, 9(th) Revision, Clinical Modification record numbers of each doctor.


RESULTS
Of the 2,292 doctors evaluated, 1,721 were aged 35-50 years and the remaining 571 were aged 51-65 years. There were 892 cardiologists who performed CC (experimental group), and the majority of these (733/892, 82.17%) were aged 35-50 years. There were 1,400 medical doctors who performed no CC from 2003 to 2006 (control group). A total of 988 of these belonged to the 35-50 years age group and 412 to the 51-65 years group. In the 35-50 years group, the controls had significantly more medical visits for hematological and thyroid cancer (p <0.05), skin disease (p <0.001), and acute upper respiratory tract infection (p <0.001) compared with the experimental group. In contrast, cardiologists who performed catheterization had more cataracts compared with the control group, but this difference was not significant.


CONCLUSIONS
Doctors who did not perform CC had more visits for radiation-related diseases than those who performed catheterization. In the experimental group, cardiologists aged 35-50 years who were exposed to radiation during CC had more visits for cataracts than the control group. We recommend that radiation protection concepts be emphasized to cardiologists, and that hospital managers be obligated to upgrade angiography equipment because the newer models have less scattered radiation.
Yuan
Mei-Kang
MK
Department of Radiology, National Yang-Ming University Hospital, Taipei 112, Taiwan, ROC.
Chien
Ching-Wen
CW
Lee
San-Kan
SK
Hsu
Nai-Wei
NW
Chang
Shih-Chieh
SC
Chang
Shu-Ju
SJ
Tang
Gau-Jun
GJ
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D006328:Cardiac Catheterization; D002309:Cardiology; D002386:Cataract / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009381:Neoplasms, Radiation-Induced / Q000453:epidemiology; D016273:Occupational Exposure / Q000009:adverse effects*; D011835:Radiation Protection; D012189:Retrospective Studies