Public release date: 27-Nov-2007

CHICAGO – The past decade has seen an unprecedented increase in the use of radiologic exams on pregnant women, according to a study presented today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA).

Through medical imaging examinations, we are exposing pregnant women to twice the amount of radiation as we did 10 years ago,” said Elizabeth Lazarus, M.D., assistant professor of diagnostic imaging at the Warren Alpert School of Medicine at Brown University in Providence, R.I. “Overall, the levels of radiation to which we are exposing pregnant women are low, but they do carry a slight risk of harm to the developing fetus.”

The investigators found that from 1997 to 2006, the number of imaging studies performed on pregnant women increased by 121 percent. The greatest increases were in the number of CT exams, which deliver more radiation than many other radiologic procedures. An abdominal CT exposes the patient to a radiation amount more than twice that of an x-ray of the lower gastrointestinal tract. An abdominal ultrasound exposes the patient to no ionizing radiation.

Other studies have shown that use of high-tech modalities, such as CT and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), has increased in all patient populations throughout the United States. According to Dr. Lazarus, some of this increase is due to the development of new imaging techniques to better diagnose abnormalities, and some is due to motivation by hospitals and insurers to make fast diagnoses to shorten hospital stays and improve patient care.