Pediatric patients require special consideration and appropriate radiation protection
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AbstractInfants and children require special attention when receiving care in the radiology department. Manual restraint techniques and commercial immobilizer devices may be used to keep the pediatric client motionless during the radiograph. Decreasing client motion helps improve image quality, thus decreasing the need for repeat x-rays. Minimizing the radiation dose is particularly important for the pediatric client. This article presents safe and effective care measures and management for pediatric immobilization techniques in the radiology department. Section snippetsThe pediatric client is at risk for injuryInfants and young children are at risk for injury from adverse effects of radiation. Rapid growth of infants and young children causes their cells and tissues to be more sensitive to damage from radiation. They are smaller and thinner than adults, so not as much radiation is required for imaging. Radiology personnel should take care to reduce exposure and use the minimum radiation doses possible to protect the pediatric client. This includes obtaining radiographs using less exposure time, Parental presenceParents should be encouraged to stay with their infant or young child if possible during radiographic examination. Most parents have a desire to stay with their child during procedures. The presence of the familiar and loving parent is comforting to a child and can lessen anxiety and protest. If the radiology department does not permit parents to stay with their child during a radiology procedure, then consideration should be given to developing such policy to allow parents to be continuously Immobilization to achieve the best image on the first attemptBecause a client's uncontrolled body motion presents a great problem with imaging and causes blurring of the radiograph, skillful use of immobilization techniques and devices is commonly used with pediatric clients in the radiology department. Recording the image correctly on the first attempt prevents need for repeated x-rays and keeps radiation dose to a minimum. There are several commercially available immobilization devices used to help minimize motion in the pediatric client. These include Pediatric client safetyIt should be emphasized that manual and/or mechanical restraints should only be used when absolutely necessary when the infant or young child cannot cooperate with verbal direction to stay motionless during an x-ray examination. Restraint should be used only for a very short time, such as 5- to 10-min duration. Examinations that require a long time to complete, such as computerized tomography scans and magnetic resonance imaging studies, often require the use of sedating drugs for infants and ConclusionDiagnostic imaging can be an integral part of health care for the pediatric client. Working together, the radiology department personnel can provide precise radiograph images with careful attention to minimizing radiation dose to the pediatric client. Radiology nurses can help to make the experience of visiting the radiology department less stressful and less frightening for the child and family. The nurse can promote parent–child togetherness, provide education and support, and provide Cited by (6)
Recommended articles (6)© 2016 by the Association for Radiologic & Imaging Nursing. How much more radiosensitive are children?Depending on their age, children are two to 10 times more sensitive to radiation than are adults, and the younger the infants or children, the more radiosensitive they are. As mentioned before, children have a longer lifetime during which cancer may develop from exposure to radiation [6], [11].
What methods are used to protect the patient from excess radiation?There are many shielding devices such as caps, lead glasses, thyroid protectors, aprons, radiation reducing gloves, and so on, for radiation safety during C-arm fluoroscopy-guided interventions.
What are the big three of radiation safety?ALARA means avoiding exposure to radiation that does not have a direct benefit to you, even if the dose is small. To do this, you can use three basic protective measures in radiation safety: time, distance, and shielding.
Why is direct patient shielding not typically used in CT?Rather it suggests that contact shielding can adversely interfere with the imaging (leading to a repeat test) and, if misplaced or allowed to move during an examination, can actually lead to increased patient radiation exposure, rather than the reverse.
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