Concerns about Radiation

Possible health risks of exposure to low-dose radiation in children, who appear to be more at risk than adults, include parotid, bone marrow, and thyroid cancer⁴⁰ Even though there is no conclusive evidence that the small, infrequent doses of radiation from dental radiographs increase risk of malignant disease, unnecessary radiation to the patient should be avoided, and care used to reduce radiation exposure if radiography is necessary^11,41 Although the American Dental Association (ADA) previously recommended using thyroid collars to protect the thyroid gland during intraoral radiography in children, these collars are no longer advised for any imaging procedures.^41,42,43 Thyroid collars, as well as abdominal (gonadal) shielding, can interfere with the primary beam, potentially causing artifacts and leading to the need for additional radiographs and it does not provide protection against internal scatter radiation.^41,43,44,45 The most effective way to minimize patient radiation exposure and protection against thyroid radiation is through the proper use of rectangular collimation, accurate patient positioning during imaging, employing appropriate dose-reduction techniques and selecting patients appropriately for imaging.^41,46 The principle for safely using radiograph-based imaging emphasizes that the clinical benefit should be achieved at the as low as reasonably possible (ALARA) radiation dose and as low as diagnostically acceptable (ALADA) dose .^47,48