This Common Medical Test Can Be Lethal...
Many of us have had a CT scan (also called a CAT scan). I had at least one CAT scan, many years ago, maybe two. It's one of the most common tests that doctors order up to get a quick, easy look inside you. Mine happened around 1980, when only three million CT scans a year were done.
Now the figure is 70 million scans a year.
Is it safer and better to get one of these noninvasive scans — or to undergo "exploratory surgery"?
Most people believe that since there's no anesthesia or cutting, the risk of a CT scan is about equivalent to having your picture taken. Read on to find out if they're right. . .
Continued below...
A U.S. President refused America's outdated cancer treatments Americans would be shocked if they knew that President Reagan, while still in the White House, turned his back on American cancer treatments. He secretly sneaked off to a German clinic — and lived another 19 years. Why? Because German cancer doctors are better — thanks to breakthrough treatments that are labeled "quackery" in the U.S. (maybe because they cost a fraction of American treatments, so there's not much profit for the cancer industry). Suzanne Somers, Cher, William Holden and Anthony Quinn are among the celebrities who have gone to clinics you'll discover in the first guide to German cancer doctors and treatments ever published in English. Click here to learn more! Take a nap and wake up free of cancer Germany's top cancer doctors literally cook cancer out of your body while you nap, and you wake up pain-free! This high-tech breakthrough is banned in America, but German doctors have used it successfully on thousands of patients from all over the world — including patients American doctors gave up on. America's cancer industry ignores the latest science and goes on pushing failed therapies that cost ten times as much. It's a fact: the hellish cancer treatments Americans take for granted are now obsolete (and that's being generous — they were never any good.)Click here and see for yourself in our guide to German cancer clinics. |
Terrifying mistakes are just the beginning of the problems
First of all, medical mistakes are much more common than you'd believe:
a) A newborn was irradiated from head to toe with no shielding of the genital region — ten times! — even though only a simple chest x-ray had been ordered. (State University of New York Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn).
In fact, they discovered that full-body x-rays of preemie babies had occurred often… that radiation levels were inappropriately high for infants… that babies were poorly positioned leading to difficult-to-interpret images.
b) A large Michigan hospital irradiated the healthy tissue of four cancer patients. Three suffered burns. A technologist had used the wrong device repeatedly.
c) A hospital in Springfield, Missouri over-radiated 76 patients, because the medical physicist selected the wrong calibration tool…
d) A large West Virginia hospital badly over-radiated brain scan patients via CT scans for more than one year after federal officials had put hospitals on alert for just such dangers. One patient's records show she received at least 10 times too much radiation.
e) New York state health officials say they've never disciplined any of the 20,000 licensed technologists for work-related problems.
And there are probably more cases yet to hit the news...
Does that mean you should
NEVER have a CT scan?
Well, that depends...
Consider the risks versus alternatives before opting in.
On July 1, 2010, the New England Journal of Medicine published two articles about the boom in medical imaging involving radiation. The most salient points are:
1. Risks of a "brain sizzle" from brain-perfusion scans may be more substantial than you realize. There are more than 400 known cases of overdoses of radiation during brain scans. And there could easily be many more…
2. Radiation from CT scans is hundreds of times higher than standard x-rays. I was horrified to learn this, and that I was exposed to that much radiation as a young man. Of course, the doctor back then didn't tell me this shocking fact.
3. Radiation is proven to be carcinogenic.
4. Doctors who order scans have limited understanding of radiation doses, and are often practicing "defensive medicine" (hoping to avoid lawsuits).
5. Radiologists, also concerned about malpractice, are pressed to find insignificant abnormalities — sending patients into a cascading succession of additional tests and treatments... which could prove to be a false positive after all.
Other things you need to know about CT scans...
i) You will get up to four times more radiation from a CT scan than experts used to think — and the old, lower figure was already a dangerously high amount.1
ii) CT scans done in 2007 alone may contribute to 29,000 new cancer cases, and 15,000 cancer deaths.2 Extrapolate this back for ten years, and you have 150,000 Americans facing horrific deaths from CT scan induced cancers.
iii) An abdominal CT scan exposes you to the same radiation amounts as 500-plus chest X-rays.3\
Yes, CT scans have virtually eliminated millions of exploratory surgeries and have allowed doctors to make critical diagnoses...
But at the same time, they are widely overused and even abused...
You may encounter an entire cadre of doctors, radiologists, technicians and more who will call you "nuts" to question conventional "wisdom".
Equipment manufacturers now promote CT scans for healthy people — to assess coronary artery calcification… virtual colonoscopy in place of standard colonoscopy (flexible tube procedures considered more effective)… brain scans…
Along with, for example, the worrisome trend for "worried well" people to get whole-body CT scans to detect abnormalities anywhere in their body — even with no symptoms — "for peace of mind" or "for early treatment options". Experts estimate whole-body scans to be equal to 900 chest X-rays.4
The National Academy of Sciences says that a 45-year-old who plans to have a whole-body scan annually till age 75 could potentially multiply cancer risk many times over.5
It's ironic that health-conscious people who are willing to pay $900-1400 out of their own pockets now inadvertently expose their bodies to huge levels of DNA gene-mutating radiation…
Now get this: it may not accomplish either of their goals.
Let's say your CT scan is "normal". It could mean:
1. Nothing significant is wrong… or
2. You might have a hidden disease that didn't show on the CT or was missed by the radiologist. So you leave with a false reassurance which conflicts with listening to your body.
If your CT is "abnormal":
1. It could be a false positive when in fact nothing is wrong… leading you into further diagnostic tests and treatments, all of which have risk factors… plus much anxiety. Now you've exposed yourself to radiation needlessly, plus increased many other risk factors including stress. Or…
2. You could have a life-threatening disease. But knowing that only helps if there is a known cure — and the disease is found early enough to benefit from the treatment.
I recommend the use of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or ultrasound (US) instead of X-rays or CT scans whenever possible.
These are the times when scans may make sense. . .
Stroke or accident victims might need an immediate CT scan, when there isn't time for an MRI.
In the case of stroke… an emergency CT scan can tell doctors whether it's a blocked artery stroke or hemorrhaging stroke, each requiring different treatment immediately to save brain function.
CT scans can help doctors diagnose trauma locations in severe accident cases.
Typically, MRI gives better contrast resolution and assessment of soft tissue pathology (tumors, ligaments, tendons…).
But MRI cannot be used when there's any metal nearby — such as with a cardiac pacemaker, an aneurysm clip on a delicate blood vessel in your brain, or metallic orthopedic hardware like metal screws or plates holding bones together.
Should you get PET scans?
PET (positron emission tomography) scans use cancer's intense hunger for sugar to detect metastases — i.e. new cancer growths — that are too small for a CT scan to detect. CT scans point to suspicious masses based on their size, while PET scans identify cancerous masses based on behavior — their glucose (blood sugar) metabolism. PET scans show the "hot spots" in your body where unusually large amounts of sugar are being consumed.
Unfortunately, PET scans expose you to almost the same dose of radiation as CT scans. The radiation in PET scans — ionizing radiation rather than X-radiation — is different but still dangerous.
There's a sidelight to the PET story that's worth mentioning: You know how most conventional doctors will tell you that changing your eating habits will make no difference in a battle against cancer. Meanwhile, alternative doctors tell you that cancer feeds on sugar and you should eliminate all sugar from your diet.
The proof is in the PET scan. Before the test, the patient is injected with glucose that's been tagged with radioactive ions. The cancer cells grab up the sugar at much higher rates than do normal cells, and the concentration of radioactivity shows up on the PET scan, telling doctors where cancer cells are located.
So while conventional doctors tell us not to worry about what we eat, the whole basis of the PET scan is the KNOWN fact that cancer cells consume sugar at a high rate.
The radioactive tags used in PET scans have a short life — nothing like radiation from a nuclear reactor. But PET scan radiation lasts long enough to do a great deal of damage.
6 questions to ask before submitting
to ANY medical imaging tests…
Some medical X-rays are unavoidable. But it's up to you to protect your own health — and to take an assessment of the total amount of radiation you're exposed to.
Your doctors won't do it for you — you may even have multiple doctors acting independently of each other ordering identical tests. Expect your doctor to ridicule you for being concerned… be prepared.
These tests emit too much radiation and should never be used for routine screening:
a) Heart scans
b) CT scans
c) Whole-body scans
d) PET scans
e) Virtual colonoscopies
The UC Berkeley Wellness Letter suggests asking these six questions before agreeing to medical imaging tests:
1. What alternatives can I use that don't involve radiation — like ultrasound, MRI, or digital photographs (for dentistry)? More on dentistry dangers in a moment…
2. Is the test really necessary? (Remember, doctors fear malpractice!)
3. What difference will it make in my care, if the result of the test is positive?
4. Is the facility accredited by the American College of Radiology?
5. Will the test use the lowest level of radiation for adequate imaging — and will it be adjusted for my size, or my child's size?
6. Will the scan be limited to the affected area? Will nearby areas be shielded?
It's your body (or your child's) that will be affected by these tests. Be ready to put your foot down and say "no" to those who want to perform risky tests on you for the money or because over-testing is standard operating procedure. Don't let a doctor use the teenager's excuse that "everyone else is doing it."
A new danger:
Growing use of CT imaging in dentistry…
Dentists and orthodontists are jumping on the CT bandwagon bigtime — embracing cone-beam CT scanners to get 3-D images of teeth… while exposing you or your child to hundreds of times more radiation exposure.
All radiation exposure is extremely serious for children. Children's cells are reproducing and developing fast, their organs are especially vulnerable, and they tend to receive more exposure to more dental and orthodontic x-rays than adults do.
Cone-beam CT scanners use less radiation than a medical CT scan. But there is no proof the radiation risk is worth it at all. Orthodontists can use a simple digital camera to get many of the same views — with NO radiation exposure whatsoever. It just takes a little longer.
So, ask yourself… Would you like the orthodontist to record the position of your child's teeth using a tiny digital camera that's entirely safe,— or to use another method that may cause cancer, just so everyone can save a little time?
Radiation is never "safe"!
For decades, radiation has been a known cause of all types of cell mutations — especially chromosomal mutations. X-rays are a well-documented cause of unstable genes — the type seen in aggressive cancers.
X-rays act like little grenades bombarding your DNA — far more damaging than the free radicals most of us try to neutralize with antioxidants.
Ionizing radiation damages the genetic material of every internal organ or cell anywhere in the path of an X-ray beam.
And that is precisely why there is NO safe dose of X-rays or ionizing radiation.
Even if one mutation isn't lethal to a cell, they persist and accumulate with each additional exposure to X-rays or other ionizing radiation…
There's plenty of good reason to ask your doctor or dentist the above six questions each and every time they want to expose you to any radiation. Because it's your life on the line.
Best regards,
Lee Euler,
Publisher
