Quantitative Benefit-Risk Analysis of Medical Radiation Exposures

While it is commonly said that the benefits of the use of radiation in the healing arts far outweigh any potential risks, there has not been to date an attempt to quantify the numerical benefits of uses of medical radiation. Using the 'Linear, No-Threshold' (LNT) model of radiation carcinogenesis, many have provided numerical estimates of the risks of radiation exposure, sometimes in irresponsible ways. In this work, we show, through several selected examples, how the numerical benefits of medical radiation exposures indeed far outweigh any theoretical cancer risks. Choosing more invasive measures, there are known rates of complications that result in mortalities in the patient populations. We note these real risks in the selected examples and compare them to the theoretical risks of cancer predicted by the LNT model. (C) 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.