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A review of non-cancer effects, especially circulatory and ocular diseases

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Abstract

There is a well-established association between high doses (>5 Gy) of ionizing radiation exposure and damage to the heart and coronary arteries, although only recently have studies with high-quality individual dosimetry been conducted that would enable quantification of this risk adjusting for concomitant chemotherapy. The association between lower dose exposures and late occurring circulatory disease has only recently begun to emerge in the Japanese atomic bomb survivors and in various occupationally exposed cohorts and is still controversial. Excess relative risks per unit dose in moderate- and low-dose epidemiological studies are somewhat variable, possibly a result of confounding and effect modification by well-known (but unobserved) risk factors. Radiation doses of 1 Gy or more are associated with increased risk of posterior subcapsular cataract. Accumulating evidence from the Japanese atomic bomb survivors, Chernobyl liquidators, US astronauts, and various other exposed groups suggests that cortical cataracts may also be associated with ionizing radiation, although there is little evidence that nuclear cataracts are radiogenic. The dose–response appears to be linear, although modest thresholds (of no more than about 0.6 Gy) cannot be ruled out. A variety of other non-malignant effects have been observed after moderate/low-dose exposure in various groups, in particular respiratory and digestive disease and central nervous system (and in particular neuro-cognitive) damage. However, because these are generally only observed in isolated groups, or because the evidence is excessively heterogeneous, these associations must be treated with caution.

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Notes

  1. The equivalent dose, in sievert (Sv), with different types of radiation absorbed dose weighted by their biological effectiveness at inducing stochastic effects, is numerically very close to the (unweighted) absorbed dose, in gray (Gy), for all studies considered here.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the National Institutes of Health, the National Cancer Institute, Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics. The author is grateful for the detailed and helpful comments of Dr Alice Sigurdson and the two referees.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Radiation Epidemiology Branch, National Cancer Institute, 9609 Medical Center Drive MSC 9778, Bethesda, MD, 20892-9778, USA

    Mark P. Little

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  1. Mark P. Little
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Correspondence to Mark P. Little.

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Little, M.P. A review of non-cancer effects, especially circulatory and ocular diseases. Radiat Environ Biophys 52, 435–449 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00411-013-0484-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00411-013-0484-7

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