Study: Children’s CT Scans May Raise Chances of Brain Cancer and Leukemia, but Risk Still Tiny
Children who get several CT scans have a slightly higher chance of brain cancer and leukemia in later life, though the risk is still small and probably outweighed by the need to get the test, researchers reported.
The use of CT scans has risen rapidly since they were introduced 30 years ago. For children, they’re used to evaluate head, neck or spine injuries or neurological disorders.
International researchers studied nearly 180,000 patients under age 22 who had a CT scan in British hospitals between 1985 and 2002. They followed those patients until 2008. They found 74 of them were diagnosed with leukemia while 135 had brain tumors.
The scientists didn’t measure the number of scans, which were mostly of the head, but looked at data measuring radiation doses from the scans. That’s because the amount of radiation received by body parts such as the brain and bone marrow depends on the age and size of the patient.
The children who later developed leukemia or brain tumors were compared to a group of people who got a very low dose of radiation to the same parts of their bodies.