Future of Diagnostic Medicine

It is estimated that 10 million people receive diagnostic, therapeutic or interventional medical radiation procedures every day. The number of occupationally exposed workers is much higher in medicine than in any other professional field.

Now for the first time in history, several countries are experiencing population doses from medical uses of radiation that exceed those from natural background radiation and exposure from other artificial sources. Thus, there is a strong need to protect patients and medical staff from accidental and unnecessary exposure.

Medical experts from about 90 countries and 17 international organizations are gathering during 3-7 December, 2012 in Bonn, Germany, at the IAEA's “International Conference on Radiation Protection in Medicine - Setting the Scene for the Next Decade” to discuss the pressing issue of overexposure to ionizing radiation, the threat posed to patients and health workers, and ways to handle and reverse the problem. The conference is intended to come out with a detailed plan of action for the reduction of medical radiation exposure (source: www.iaea.org).