Biological Effects - Video Lesson

Welcome back. This lesson is about the biological effects of radiation exposure. CT is actually a very safe imaging procedure, but it possible for things to go wrong, and that's what this lesson is about. The first series of biological effects that we'll discuss are called deterministic effects. Deterministic effects only occur at very specific doses of radiation and not before. They're very predictable, hence the name deterministic. These types of effects from radiation do have a dose threshold, which means that these dose responses don't occur below certain dose levels. And that's basically what the graph on the left is telling us. At a minimum dose, these effects may begin to occur, and as the dose increases, the severity of the effects increases. Here's a few examples of the doses and dose thresholds that can occur in response to radiation. Radiation induced miscarriage begins to occur at a dose of one hundred milligram to the gonads of an expecting female. Oligospermia refers to a diminutive