Information for patients
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This leaflet explains the potential risk from having X-ray imaging. It does not apply to other kinds of medical imaging such as Ultrasound and MRI Scans.
What is an X-ray?
X-ray examinations use a special kind of light beam. The beam cannot be seen with the eye. It can pass right through your body to make images of what is inside. This kind of beam is also called “ionising radiation”. Ionising radiation does not stay inside you and disappears as soon as the X-ray has finished.
Ionising radiation is all around us in small amounts. This called “background radiation”.
Why am I having an X-ray?
X-ray examinations produce images of the inside of your body. They have many uses including:
- To help find out what is wrong with you.
- To check on progress of an illness or injury.
- To help carry out an internal procedure as part of your treatment.
- To provide your doctor with other clinical information.
Your healthcare team have recommended that an X-ray will be of benefit to you, and the request has been checked by specially trained staff that it is the right one for you and your condition.
When deciding on whether an X-ray is required (and what kind), the healthcare professionals involved always check that the benefit of having the X-ray is greater than the risk.
What are the risks in using ionising radiation?
As the Ionising radiation passes through the body it can cause damage. The amount of damage depends on how strong the X-ray beam is. Different strengths of beam are used for different kinds of X-ray images. Normally your body can fix the damage. In some rare cases the damage can become cancer after many years or decades.
The normal risk of getting cancer during your lifetime is 1 in 2. This means that about half of the people living in the UK will get cancer at some point in their life. Having an X-ray will increase this risk by a tiny amount.
The table below tells you how much radiation you are likely to get from different types of X-ray examination by comparing it to background radiation. It also shows how this may affect your cancer risk. The second table shows the risks for some different types of events for comparison.
| Type of X-ray Examination/Scan | Typical Equivalent Background Radiation | Number of People who may be affected | Risk Level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dental X-ray/ DEXA scan | < 1 day | Fewer than 1 in 100,000 | Negligible |
| Chest or Limb/ Extremity X-ray | 1 – 2 days | Fewer than 1 in 100,000 | Negligible |
| Abdomen/Pelvis X-ray | 1 – 2 months | Fewer than 1 in 10,000 | Very Low |
| CT Scan of Head or Limb | 3 – 6 months | Fewer than 1 in 10,000 | Very Low |
| Contrast X-ray procedure where ‘X-ray dye’ used (such as a barium study or angiogram) | 6 – 12 months | Fewer than 1 in 10,000 | Very Low |
| Interventional X-ray examination (such as a stent insertion) | 1 – 2 years | Fewer than 1 in 1000 | Low |
| CT Scan of body | 1 – 4 years | Fewer than 1 in 1000 | Low |
In comparison to the following:
| Types of events | Typical Equivalent background radiation | Number of people who may be affected | Risk Level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hit by lighting | – | Fewer than 1 in 1,000,000 | Negligible |
| Transatlantic flight | 10 days | Fewer than 1 in 100,00 | Minimal |
| Fatal accident on the railway | – | Fewer than 1 in 100,00 | Minimal |
| UK average annual radiation dose | 1 year | Fewer than 1 in 10,000 | Very Low |
| Fatal accident at home | – | Fewer than 1 in 10,000 | Very Low |
| Average annual Radon (*) does to people in Cornwall | 1 – 4 years | Fewer than 1 in 1,000 | Low |
| Fatal accident on the road | – | Fewer than 1 in 1,000 | Low |
Further risk comparisons can be found at:
What if I may be pregnant?
Exposure of an unborn baby to ionising radiation may cause a slight increase in their cancer risk. For this reason, X-ray examination of the abdomen or pelvic area are usually avoided when pregnancy is possible or confirmed, unless the risk of not performing the X-ray is greater. You must tell your healthcare team if there is any possibility of you being pregnant.
X-rays of parts of the body well away from the abdomen such as limbs (arms and legs) and dental X-rays do not give any increased risk to an unborn baby.
What about children?
Long term effects from ionising radiation can take many years to come about. The risk of long term effects is increased slightly in younger people because they have more time left for them to develop.
The healthcare team take account of this when deciding if a child needs an X-ray examination, and the amount of radiation used is kept as low as possible.
What if I don’t have the examination?
The risk of not having the examination is that it may not be possible to find out what is wrong with you, or how best to treat you. You should discuss any concerns you may have with your healthcare team.
What if I have more questions?
Please talk to your doctor or any of the team carrying out your X-ray if you would like to discuss any of this information further.
This leaflet reproduced with kind permission of the Northern Medical Physics & Clinical Engineering group.
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Leaflet reference: PIL1538
Date for Review: September 2027