ReviewThe Science of the total environment2022
Cancer risks among studies of medical diagnostic radiation exposure in early life without quantitative estimates of dose.
Review in The Science of the total environment, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 27 citations in OpenAlex.
- Radiomitigators: Breakthroughs in Post-Radiation Recovery.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- A Historical Survey of Key Epidemiological Studies of Ionizing Radiation Exposure.Radiation research · 2024Review
- A generalisation of the method of regression calibration and comparison with Bayesian and frequentist model averaging methods.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Article
- Recommendations on statistical approaches to account for dose uncertainties in radiation epidemiologic risk models.International journal of radiation biology · 2024Review
- Radiotherapy for non-cancer diseases: benefits and long-term risks.International journal of radiation biology · 2024Review
- A generalisation of the method of regression calibration and comparison with the Bayesian 2-dimensional Monte Carlo method.Research square · 2023Article
- A generalisation of the method of regression calibration.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- A generalisation of the method of regression calibration.Research square · 2023Article
- Low-dose radiotherapy for COVID-19 pneumonia and cancer: summary of a recent symposium and future perspectives.International journal of radiation biology · 2023Article
- Low-Dose Extrapolation Factors Implied by Mortality and Incidence Data from the Japanese Atomic Bomb Survivor Life Span Study Data.Radiation research · 2022Article
- The Evidence for Excess Risk of Cancer and Non-Cancer Disease at Low Doses and Dose Rates.Radiation research · 2022Article
- Review of the risk of cancer following low and moderate doses of sparsely ionising radiation received in early life in groups with individually estimated doses.Environment international · 2022Review
- Age effects on radiation response: summary of a recent symposium and future perspectives.International journal of radiation biology · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors at 7 institutions in 5 countries.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundThere is accumulating evidence of excess risk of cancer in various populations exposed at acute doses below several tens of mSv or doses received over a protracted period. There is also evidence that relative risks are generally higher after radiation exposures in utero or in childhood. METHODS AND
findingsWe reviewed and summarised evidence from 89 studies of cancer following medical diagnostic exposure in utero or in childhood, in which no direct estimates of radiation dose are available. In all of the populations studied exposure was to sparsely ionizing radiation (X-rays). Several of the early studies of in utero exposure exhibit modest but statistically significant excess risks of several types of childhood cancer. There is a highly significant (p < 0.0005) negative trend of odds ratio with calendar period of study, so that more recent studies tend to exhibit reduced excess risk. There is no significant inter-study heterogeneity (p > 0.3). In relation to postnatal exposure there are significant excess risks of leukaemia, brain and solid cancers, with indications of variations in risk by cancer type (p = 0.07) and type of exposure (p = 0.02), with fluoroscopy and computed tomography scans associated with the highest excess risk. However, there is highly significant inter-study heterogeneity (p < 0.01) for all cancer endpoints and all but one type of exposure, although no significant risk trend with calendar period of study.
conclusionsOverall, this large body of data relating to medical diagnostic radiation exposure in utero provides support for an associated excess risk of childhood cancer. However, the pronounced heterogeneity in studies of postnatal diagnostic exposure, the implied uncertainty as to the meaning of summary measures, and the distinct possibilities of bias, substantially reduce the strength of the evidence from the associations we observe between radiation imaging in childhood and the subsequent risk of cancer being causally related to radiation exposure.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.