Take a drive round sure neighborhoods in Los Angeles and you could spot as many indicators promoting physique scans as burger joints. Or perhaps you’ve got seen the advertisements on TV or the web: “Shield your well being! Get a physique scan now!”
Are whole-body CT scans actually in a position to do this – and what are the dangers? And are DEXA scans a great way to verify in your physique composition?
Whereas applied sciences fluctuate, most of those high-tech checkups use computed tomography (CT) scans to look at your total physique or particular components, such because the coronary heart and lungs, to attempt to catch harmful ailments in earlier, extra curable phases.
In the course of the 15- or 20-minute scan, you lie inside a doughnut-shaped machine as an imaging system rotates round you, transmitting radiation. The method combines a number of X-ray photographs and, with the help of a pc, produces cross-sectional views of your physique. By analyzing the views, a health care provider can search for early indicators of abnormalities.
The scans aren’t low-cost – whole-body scans run wherever from $500 to $1,000 per scan and normally aren’t reimbursed by insurance coverage. And the query of how useful these scans actually are is a matter of debate amongst medical specialists.
Advocates promote scans as a sensible a part of a routine bodily examination. However when you’re wholesome, with no worrisome signs, a scan is normally not warranted, says Arl Van Moore, MD, a radiologist and medical assistant professor of radiology at Duke College Medical Heart in Durham, NC, who can also be a spokesman for the American Faculty of Radiology (ACR).
In response to the ACR’s official place, there’s not sufficient proof to suggest scans for these with no signs or household historical past suggesting illness. However Van Moore sees a doable exception. “There could also be a profit to folks at excessive threat of lung cancers, resembling present people who smoke or these with an extended historical past of smoking,” he says.
For wholesome folks, the scans might trigger undue fear – as an illustration, by discovering one thing that seems to be benign. Plus, the quantity of radiation publicity, particularly with frequent scans, is one other concern. If scans are completed too usually, the radiation publicity may very well improve the variety of most cancers instances over the long run, based on a 2004 report within the journal Radiology.
The American Faculty of Preventive Drugs says that whole-body scans “aren’t excellent at discovering most cancers in folks with out signs” and that the radiation you get from these scans can improve your threat of most cancers.
Earlier than scheduling a physique scan, discuss to your physician about your total well being dangers and the way a scan might or might not enable you to. Particularly, ask your self:
- What’s your historical past? Do you’ve got a private or household historical past of lung illness, coronary heart illness, or particular cancers?
- Did you inhale? Are you a longtime smoker?
- If that’s the case, how lengthy? Even when you’ve stop smoking, for what number of years had been you an lively smoker?
This can be a completely different sort of scan, referred to as DEXA (twin power X-ray absorptiometry). You may need heard of DEXA scans to verify on bone density to see when you’ve got osteoporosis or osteopenia. It makes use of low-level X-rays to verify in your physique composition, like how a lot physique fats you’ve got and the place it’s in your physique.
There are numerous methods to measure your physique fats. Specialists have advised WebMD prior to now that DEXA scanning is a “excellent method” and “one of the vital correct strategies on the market.” And researchers have referred to as it the “gold customary” for checking on physique composition – particularly, for bone, fats, and muscle. Nevertheless it’s not coated by insurance coverage, except you’re getting a DEXA scan to display screen for bone density. The price of a DEXA scan varies, beginning round $75 in some instances.