![]() In recent years, researchers have also learned more about how X-rays reach parts of the body when they are not directly imaged. The data available right now supports not using a shield to cover the ovaries/testicles, as they don’t really reduce the radiation dose and could actually make it higher. In one study, researchers noted that a 4-year-old getting a routine X-ray today receives just 0.06 mGy (milligray), compared to 2.5 mGy six decades ago. When pelvic shielding became required in the 1970s, it was because exposure to radiation was far more extensive, says Adel Mustafa, PhD, a Yale School of Medicine medical physicist. Today’s machines emit just 10% of the radiation that older technology did. One reason lead shields aren’t helpful during X-rays is because modern equipment uses far less radiation to capture a high-resolution image. Why patients don’t need pelvic shielding for X-ray To ease any fears about this change, we asked radiology experts at Yale Medicine to explain the reasons behind the change in guidelines. “People may be thinking in the back of their head, ‘Is this technologist forgetting to cover my pelvis?’” Dr. This counterintuitive move to stop pelvic shielding might be confusing to patients who feel comforted by the lead shields, especially expecting mothers. Pahade points out that lead shielding policies to protect the patient’s thyroid gland and breasts haven’t changed yet but likely will. In light of these findings, numerous national societies, including the American College of Radiology, now recommend that radiologic technologists and technicians at hospitals and clinics can stop using pelvic shields on patients of all ages, including pregnant women. And, perhaps surprisingly, the researchers also found that, in this case, a pelvic shield sometimes increases a person’s exposure to radiation (explained below). When radiologists and medical physicists at the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM) and National Counsel on Radiation Protection and Measurement (NCRP) both recently examined this decades-old practice, called gonadal (or pelvic) shielding, they found no evidence that low-dose radiation used during routine X-ray exams currently causes harm to patients’ reproductive organs. But, he adds, there wasn’t a lot of science to support that. “For many decades, we’ve thought even a small amount of radiation that reached the testes or ovaries could have a significant effect on heritable defects and could potentially increase risk of developing cancer,” says Yale Medicine radiologist Jay Pahade, MD. Knowing we are being exposed to any level of radiation, even in small amounts, taps into our deeply ingrained fear of its potentially harmful effects. ![]() Patients have come to expect this shielding over their reproductive organs as necessary protection during X-rays. ![]() If you’ve ever had a pelvic X-ray, you’ve probably felt comforted by the lead aprons technologists placed around your waist to prevent excess exposure to radiation.
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