Radiation doses in medical research

[P.N. HIRSCHMANN]

There are two separate issues.

Ethical approval by your local Research Ethics committee and
patient consent.

The former will follow ICRP and do a risk-benefit analysis,
particularly if the examinations cannot be justified clinically.
Doses from subtraction radiography fall into the ICRP trivial
category and it has to be shown that the level of benefit to society
is at least minor.

Even if you have research ethics approval, the patients have to give
informed consent, including an explanation of why the examination
is more likely to benefit society than them. They are at liberty to
withhold consent and withdraw from your experiment.

As Gutteridge showed in her review in DMFR, there has been lots
of work using subtraction radiography in perio disease but little, if
any, that benefited patients as a whole





Date sent:              Tue, 4 Sep 2001 09:57:36 +0200
Send reply to:          Oral Radiology Discussion Group <ORADLIST at LISTSERV.UCLA.EDU>
From:                   Ale  Fidler <ales.fidler at MF.UNI-LJ.SI>
Subject:                Radiation doses in  medical research
To:                     ORADLIST at LISTSERV.UCLA.EDU

I'm interested in radiation doses, allowed in medical research.

In subtraction radiography, how many periapicals are allowed in one year? In Zappa's article (1993), ICRP regultions are cited, which allow one tenth of dose-equivalent limits applicable to individual members of the public for children and people incapable of giving their true consent. In 1990
this dose was 100 microSv. Whould about adults, who are capable of  giving their true consent.
Are there any new regulations?

Regards!


Ales Fidler