Implications of Medical Low Dose Radiation Exposure

Objective

MEDIRAD aims to enhance the scientific bases and clinical practice of radiation protection (RP) in the medical field and thereby addresses the need to understand and evaluate the health effects of low dose ionising radiation exposure from diagnostic and therapeutic imaging and from off-target effects in radiotherapy (RT).
MEDIRAD will pursue 3 major operational objectives: First, it will improve organ dose estimation and registration to inform clinical practice, optimise doses, set recommendations and provide adequate dosimetry for clinical-epidemiological studies of effects of medical radiation. Second, it aims to evaluate and understand the effects of medical exposures, focusing on the two major endpoints of public health relevance: cardiovascular effects of low to moderate doses of radiation from RT in breast cancer treatment incl. understanding of mechanisms; and long-term effects on cancer risk of low doses from CT in children. Third, it will develop science-based consensus policy recommendations for the effective protection of patients, workers and the general public.
Within the 4-year project a multi-disciplinary consortium will, in close interaction with European medical associations, MELODI and EURADOS (1), develop a tool to determine image quality to maximise optimisation of RP in medical imaging, (2) improve and develop new individual organ/anatomical structure dosimetry from chest CT, I131 administration, fluoroscopy-guided procedures, hybrid imaging, and RT for breast cancer and interlinks with image quality measures, (3) conduct epidemiological studies of consequences of RT and CT, (4) identify potential novel imaging and circulating biomarkers and mechanisms of radiation effects, (5) develop innovative risk models, (6) develop and implement for the first time a European repository of patient dose and imaging data, (7) develop science-based recommendations, and (8) introduce novel approaches to bring together the nuclear and medical sectors.

Field of science

/medical and health sciences/health sciences/epidemiology
/medical and health sciences/clinical medicine/radiology/nuclear medicine
/medical and health sciences/health sciences/public and environmental health
/natural sciences/computer and information sciences/data science/big data
/engineering and technology/medical engineering/diagnostic imaging
/medical and health sciences/clinical medicine/cancer/breast cancer
/social sciences/sociology/governance/crisis management
/medical and health sciences/clinical medicine/cardiology/cardiovascular diseases
/natural sciences/chemical sciences/inorganic chemistry/inorganic compounds

Funding Scheme

RIA - Research and Innovation action

Coordinator

EIBIR GEMEINNUTZIGE GMBH ZUR FORDERUNG DER ERFORSCHUNG DER BIOMEDIZINISCHEN BILDGEBUNG

Address

Am Gestade 1
1010 Wien
Austria

Activity type

Research Organisations

EU contribution

€ 503 750

Objective

Field of science

Programme(s)

Topic(s)

Call for proposal

Funding Scheme

Coordinator

Participants (34)

Share this page

Download