Australian patients not informed on cancer risks from CT scans

Doctors underestimating CT scan risks, Rheumatology Update, 22 March 2010, Patients are not being properly informed about the potential for cancer from tests involving ionising radiation, Australian doctors warn.Writing in the Medical Journal of Australia, they claimed that while radiologists understood the risks of CT, referring doctors had limited knowledge of these risks.

As a result, they said, most patients presenting for CT scans were not aware of the potential for harm from the investigation.

Children and young adults were most vulnerable, they said, with a risk of fatal malignancy from a single CT scan of about 1 in 1000.

Dr John de Campo and Dr Margaret de Campo, radiologists at Tweed Heads in Northern NSW, argued parents should have to give informed consent before CT scans could be performed in children and young adults.