CardioPulse ArticlesCardiologists urged to reduce inappropriate radiation exposureMoving from political declaration to action on reducing the global burden of cardiovascular diseases: a statement from the Global Cardiovascular Disease TaskforceThe new US Healthcare Law

# Cardiologists urged to reduce inappropriate radiation exposure {#article-title-2} Radiation from cardiology procedures equals more than 50 chest X-rays per person each year Cardiologists have been urged to reduce patient radiation exposure in a European Society of Cardiology (ESC) position paper that outlines doses and risks of common cardiology examinations for the first time. ![Graphic][1] ![Graphic][2] The full paper, entitled ‘The appropriate and justified use of medical radiation in cardiovascular imaging: a position document of the ESC Associations of Cardiovascular Imaging and Percutaneous Cardiovascular Interventions’, was published in European Heart Journal (EHJ) .1 ![Graphic][3] The lead author, Dr Eugenio Picano (Pisa, Italy), said: ‘Cardiologists today are the true contemporary radiologists. Cardiology accounts for 40% of patient radiology exposure and equals more than 50 chest X-rays per person per year’. He added: ‘Unfortunately, radiation risks are not widely known to all cardiologists and patients and this creates a potential for unwanted damage that will appear as cancers, decades later. We need the entire cardiology community to be proactive in minimising the radiological friendly fire in our imaging labs’. The paper lists doses and risks of the most common cardiology examinations for the first time. CT, PCI, cardiac electrophysiology, and nuclear cardiology deliver a dose equivalent to 750 chest X-rays (with wide variation from 100 to 2000 chest X-rays) per procedure. PCI for dilation of coronary artery stenosis totals almost 1 million procedures per year in Europe. The additional lifetime risk of fatal and non-fatal cancer for one PCI ranges from 1 in 1000, to 1 in 100 for a healthy 50-year- old man. Risks are 1.38 times higher in women and 4 times higher in children. Dr Picano said: ‘Even in the best centres, and even when the income of doctors is not related to number of examinations performed, 30 to 50% of examinations are totally or partially inappropriate according to specialty … [1]: /embed/inline-graphic-1.gif [2]: /embed/inline-graphic-2.gif [3]: /embed/inline-graphic-3.gif