European Journal of Molecular & Clinical Medicine

Abstract

Background – Radiologic technologists are under the exposure of ionizing radiations for long duration of their occupational work life. Ionizing radiations have previously been found to damage the lung tissue and cause fibrosis.
Methods–Spirometry, a measure of pulmonary function tests was performed on radiologic technologists (n=23) and was compared with healthy subjects (n=23). To assess the effect of duration of radiation exposure over spirometry, correlation analysis along with linear regression was performed with their duration of exposure to ionizing radiations.
Results – There was a significantly lower FVC % of predicted (p = 0.04) and MVV% of predicted (p =   0.05) values among radiologic technologists as compared to healthy controls.  Further with increasing duration of exposure to ionizing radiations, a significant negative correlation was observed for FVC % of predicted (p value = 0.004) FEV1 % of predicted (p value = 0.015) PEFR % of predicted (p value = 0.046) and MVV % of predicted (p value = 0.037).
Conclusion – Ionizing radiations affect the lungs of radiologic technologists and the restrictive type pattern was noted.  In subjects with higher duration of radiation exposure the effect is more pronounced.