| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| n8xyn |
Posted - 10/25/2018 : 09:57:54
My mother (81) just went in today for some radioactive test today. She was injected with a dye then entered a scanner. I thought oh what the heck I'll take a reading after she got home expecting something a little above background. Man was I surprised! She is reading far hotter then any ore sample I have and I would have pulled an exact reading but didn't want to alarm her.... I started detecting her at 10 feet or more with my GMC 500+.... I really didn't expect anything like that... |
| 10 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Omega-Man |
Posted - 11/06/2018 : 04:51:14
Your Mom most likely got some Technetium 99m at the Hospital, they use it for example for kidney and thyroid scintigraphy.
I also had to do that recently, I got 61 MBq and measuring at my beer belly I had up to 25 uSv/h.
But the Technetium 99m only has a halflife of 6 hours, so after two days (8 halflifes) only 0,4% of the initial TC-99m is left, so it is all good.
But anyhow, the scinigraphy alone is about 50% of the annual dose of the average citizen... i probably end up at 2,4 Millisievert/y at the end of this year |
| ullix |
Posted - 11/05/2018 : 01:38:58
@Stargazer: you are not the only one to expect radiation rooms. To quote from the Taiwan article:
quote:
Medical treatments with long-term low dose rate ionizing radiation or with acute low dose exposures could be employed to prevent and control serious illnesses with no symptomatic side effects. [25] For example, the evidence suggests that an annual supplement of whole-body radiation—50 mSv in several fractionated exposures—to elderly volunteers would stimulate their defences and provide protection against the scourge of cancer.
Living in the Denver area - I once lived in Boulder - is not a bad thing for whatever the reason ;-)
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| Stargazer 40 |
Posted - 11/04/2018 : 06:15:11
What an interesting article! While a nice summary though, you'd have to look at each of these studies for and against low level dosage benefit and see just what they were focused on measuring. Certainly worth the effort if you are subject to environments where low level dosages are likely. I thought maybe there is some real benefit to living at high altitude in Denver. Doesn't get to beneficial levels, so doesn't appear harmful, but not helpful either.
I know people that go for hyperbaric oxygen treatment. Wonder if one day we might have low level ionizing radiation rooms where you could go weekly or even daily and get irradiated. Jury seems to be leaning toward that being a good thing from this article. |
| ullix |
Posted - 11/04/2018 : 04:11:29
Thanks for the update. Recommended reading, as it is a very recent mini-review on the topic with helpful references! |
| GBG12 |
Posted - 10/31/2018 : 19:54:31
Sorry about that; I corrected the link above. |
| ullix |
Posted - 10/28/2018 : 23:50:51
@GBG12: Apparently wrong link; is the same one that I posted. I am intersted in your link |
| GBG12 |
Posted - 10/28/2018 : 19:28:10
Very interesting article! I initially thought there must be confounding factors such as socio-economic factors, but the authors ruled those out. It clearly supports the hormesis model (that low dose radiation is better for us than none). This 2015 article describes why the LNT model won over the hormesis model in US and International law-making:
*link now corrected, manually add 'tt' to make 'http'* [site admin, why do you still reject http but allow https and www?]
h**p://tech.snmjournals.org/content/43/4/242.full
It seems pretty clear that the exact effects of low radiation doses are not known. |
| ullix |
Posted - 10/26/2018 : 00:43:29
So this "dye" had a bit more in it than just colors ;-). Do you know what exactly it was, and what the dose was? Just very curious.
Your mother may have received the treatment to easily bring her to the 100! Not a joke at all, but a very significant discovery; read this article:
Effects of Cobalt-60 Exposure on Health of Taiwan Residents Suggest New Approach Needed in Radiation Protection https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2477708/
The key finding is shown in this graph:
Image Insert:
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Can you imagine the impact? Radioactive exposure may improve your health, has a positive impact on on longevity. This finding counters all existing LNT (Linear No Threshold) theories!
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| n8xyn |
Posted - 10/25/2018 : 13:36:48
I cut it short at close to 4000 cpm and yes you are absolutely right about all the noise. I never thought a human body could read like that without me denying access to the shelter ;-)
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| Stargazer 40 |
Posted - 10/25/2018 : 10:55:51
The 500+'s M4011 tube goes to Medium warning at 50CPM. That's about twice a normal daily background rate. It goes to High warning at 100CPM. That's still less than 1uSv/h. Radiation from nuclear medicine can seem quite intense because speaker is clicking intensely and alarm can also be blaring away. But in reality there really isn't a significant cause for concern. These personal meters are quite sensitive. A typical whole body CT gives the body about 20mSv. That's two thousand times what your High warning threshold is, but really is only about six times what a person gets in background dosage in the course of a year. I believe no amount of radiation is ever healthy, but 20mSv is less than half the baseline exposure (50mSv) that the EPA states 'usually results in no harmful health effects'. Read the EPA discussion on radiation health effect under the last sticky in this forum, second post. A full body PET scan can be as much as 50% greater than the CT. Still not at the EPA threshold.
You don't want to do a bunch of these for sure, but the imaging/diagnostic benefits certainly justify the risk for most situations. |
