Ionizing radiations in medicine

When ionizing radiation was discovered, it was not known that it could harm people, and many scientists and others who were exposed to the rays suffered forms of radiation sickness and cancer. The field of health physics, which is most concerned with the safety of radiation, began to develop in the early part of the twentieth century. By the 2000 s, the benefits and risks of radiation had come to be clearly understood by physicians, nuclear energy workers, and most of the public. Federal laws were created to regulate the use of ionizing radiation in medicine and other industries. 

Use of ionizing radiation in the manufacture of medicinal products Good manufacturing practice for investigational medicinal products Manufacture of products derived from human blood or human plasma... 

Annex 12 Use of ionizing radiation in the manufacture of medicinal products... 

UptonAC. 1993. Ionizing radiation. In Rom WN, ed. Environmental and occupational medicine, 1071-1083. 

Tsuiki S, Iregami A Personality tests on the atomic bomb exposed children, in Research in the Effects and Influences of the Nuclear Bomb Test Explosions II. Tokyo, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, 1956, pp 1709-1714 Upton AC Ionizing radiation, in Public Health and Preventive Medicine. Edited by Wallace RB, Doebbeling BN, Last JM. Stamford, CT, Appleton Lange, 1998, pp 619-626... 

Annex 12 Use of Ionizing Radiation in the Manufacture of Medicinal Products... 

NOTE The holder of, or applicant for, a marketing authorization for a product which includes irradiation as part of its processing should also refer to the note produced by the Committee for Proprietary Medicinal Products giving guidance on ionizing radiation in the manufacture of medicinal products1. 

Validation is the action of proving that the process, i.e., the delivery of the intended absorbed dose to the product, will achieve the expected results. The requirements for validation are given more fully in the note for guidance on the use of ionizing radiation in the manufacture of medicinal products. 

NOTE The general chapters of the guide to GMP apply to products derived from human blood or plasma, unless otherwise stated. Some of the annexes may also apply, e.g., the annex on manufacture of sterile medicinal products (Annex 1), the annex on the use of ionizing radiation in the manufacture of medicinal products (Annex 12) and the annex on biological medicinal products (Annex 2). 

Ionizing radiation in the environment arises firom both natural and artificial sources. Natural sources include cosmic rays and y-rays from Earth artificial sources include X-rays in medicine and discharges of radioactive waste from the nuclear industry. Sometimes the separation between natural and artificial sources involves difficulties for example, the radionuclides and in the air can result firom both cosmic rays and the nuclear industry. 

It is clear that, along with the discovery of x-rays in 1895, Roentgen also found the chemical action of ionizing radiation. He drew attention to the similarity of the photographic effect induced by light and x-rays. Application to medicine appeared very quickly, followed by industrial applications. However, this field of investigation remained nameless until Milton Burton, in 1942, christened it radiation chemistry to separate it from radiochemistry which is the study of radioactive nuclei. Historical and classical work in radiation chemistry has been reviewed by Mozumder elsewhere [1]. Here we will only make a few brief remarks. 

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