Diagnostic Imaging Is Common in Children

More than 40% of continuously enrolled children in a national healthcare organization underwent at least one imaging procedure during a 3-year period.

The rapid increase in diagnostic imaging has raised concern about low-dose ionizing radiation exposure in children. Two new studies shed light on this problem.

In one study, investigators used claims data from a large national healthcare organization to determine how many diagnostic imaging procedures with ionizing radiation were performed in continuously enrolled children (age, <18 years) between 2005 and 2007. Among 355,000 children, 151,000 (43%) underwent 437,000 imaging procedures; 25% underwent 2 or more procedures, and 16% underwent 3 or more. Plain radiographs accounted for 85% of procedures, and computed tomography (CT) accounted for 12%. Overall, 8% of all children had at least one CT scan, and 3.5% had two or more.

Another study dr…

Reviewing Authors

Howard Bauchner, MD

Disclosures

Grant / research supportHuman Resources and Services Administration; NIH; NIH-NHLBI; USDA; GlaxoSmithKline

Editorial boardsArchives of Disease in Childhood (Editor-in-Chief)

Howard Bauchner, MD

Disclosures

Grant / research supportHuman Resources and Services Administration; NIH; NIH-NHLBI; USDA; GlaxoSmithKline

Editorial boardsArchives of Disease in Childhood (Editor-in-Chief)

Allan S. Brett, MD

Disclosures

Nothing to disclose

Allan S. Brett, MD

Disclosures

Nothing to disclose