Keywords:
Quality assurance, Kv imaging, Education and training, Radiation safety, Radiation effects, Education, Digital radiography, Conventional radiography, Radioprotection / Radiation dose, Professional issues, Paediatric
Authors:
G. NG1, D. Tse1, V. Lee1, Y.-L. Li1, M. CHEUNG2, L. CHIN1, S. Lau1, W. M. W. Lam1, P. W. T. Lam1; 1Department of Radiology, Queen Mary Hospital/HK, 2Hong Kong/HK
DOI:
10.26044/ecr2019/C-1836
Aims and objectives
Radiography of the pelvis and hip is commonly performed in assessing hip pathologies in pediatrics.
The European Directive on health protection identifies children as a special practice that merit particular attention from the radiation protection point of view,
mainly due to the increased radiosensitivities of tissues and lifetime risk for carcinogenesis in the pediatric group.
Radiation protection during radiography of the pelvis has always been portrayed as challenging due to the location of the gonads.
It is the professional responsibility of the radiographer to ensure that and optimise the examination for each individual patient.
Existing guidelines such as the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) state that good radiographic technique includes the standard use of protective shielding without obscuring essential diagnostic information,
and gonads should be protected whenever it is possible and lie within 5cm of the primary beam.
We conducted this study in an attempt to evaluate the compliance of using gonad protection in pediatric patients when performing pelvic and hip radiographs in our hospital,
Queen Mary Hospital,
which is a tertiary referral center in Hong Kong,
and whether the gonad shield was appropriately placed.