Pediatric radiation dose and risk from bone density measurements using a GE Lunar Prodigy scanner

Abstract

The effective doses and potential cancer risks associated with pediatric DXA examinations performed on a GE Lunar Prodigy fan-beam scanner were found to be comparable to doses and risks reported from pencil-beam DXA devices.

Radiation Exposure in Bone Densitometry

“…Huge differences of patient radiation dose have also been recorded among scanners with different fan-beam technologies. 27 Specifically, effective doses for spine DXA acquisitions were found at 0.67 μSv and 0.97 μSv for a 5-and 10-year-old child for an examination performed on a Lunar Prodigy GE scanner, whereas the corresponding values recorded from a Hologic Discovery/QDR4500 scanner were 8.8 μSv and 6.9 μSv, respectively. 26,27 Other significant parameters that affect patient radiation dose from DXA examinations include patient's body size, beam filtration, tube current, tube potential, imaging speed, length and width, number of images, and the selected imaging protocol.…”

“…27 Specifically, effective doses for spine DXA acquisitions were found at 0.67 μSv and 0.97 μSv for a 5-and 10-year-old child for an examination performed on a Lunar Prodigy GE scanner, whereas the corresponding values recorded from a Hologic Discovery/QDR4500 scanner were 8.8 μSv and 6.9 μSv, respectively. 26,27 Other significant parameters that affect patient radiation dose from DXA examinations include patient's body size, beam filtration, tube current, tube potential, imaging speed, length and width, number of images, and the selected imaging protocol. The acquisition mode should be carefully selected prior to each procedure to achieve the maximum diagnostic quality at the minimum radiation burden, especially for those vulnerable to radiation dose, such as children and pregnant women.…”

“…21,22 Radiation Exposure DXA, as a radiologic examination, is associated with a radiation burden to the exposed patients. [23][24][25][26][27][28] However, the radiation dose from DXA examinations is very low compared with other radiologic procedures, as illustrated in ►Table 1. 29,30 Especially for the pencil-beam technology DXA scanners, radiation dose to the patient is below the average daily natural background of 8 μSv.…”

“…►Fig. 1 shows the effective and the entrance surface dose (ESD) from whole-body DXA acquisitions for the average neonate, 1-, 5-, and 10-year-old child, adapted from the phantom study by Damilakis et al 27 The increase observed on ESD as the age of the child increases is due to the larger amount of scatter radiation in the larger body size. 26 Although infrequent, pregnant patients who receive heparin may need to undergo a DXA examination.…”

Bone densitometry in children and adolescents

“…It is preferred because of its widespread availability, precision, low radiation exposure, and scan speed [2,3]. Additionally, DXA…”