Re: Nasal Treatment with RF?- vs. Nasal Radium/X-rays "Historic"

[FIELDRW@aol.com]

Stewart,

As a person who received x -ray "therapy" to my head to shrink lymphatic 
tissues in the area of my middle ear (procedure in 1964), I prefer to think 
as those kind of procedures as being "historic" or "in the past".  My therapy 
was prescribed by a local (Lancaster, PA) hearing loss conservation" program 
for schoolchildren run by the State of Pennsylvania.  I indeed hope such 
"therapy" is in the past. My only point was that x-rays were also used to 
shrink tissues (tonsils, etc.) in children (the children were not always that 
young) and that that the procedure should also be acknowledged.  You do an 
admirable job representing the radium exposed individuals, please try to also 
remember the x-ray exposed individuals.  Far too little follow-up research 
has been done on this cohort of individuals as well.  The adverse non-cancer 
outcomes from these kinds of procedures are not well understood or the 
resulting damage appreciated.

Regards, 
Bill Field
College of Public Health
Department of Epidemiology
University of Iowa
mailto:bill-field@uiowa.edu


In a message dated 11/30/99 3:04:54 PM Central Standard Time, 
RADPROJECT@aol.com writes:

<< Dear Radsafe:
 
 It is worth noting that the use of Nasal Radium Irradiation to shrink 
tonsils 
 and adenoids in young children is, for many individuals, not that distant in 
 the past or "historic", to use Dr. Field's word, as  most including the CDC 
 asssume. The US Centers for Disease Control has derived a very rough 
estimate 
 that from 571,000 to 2.6 million children received NRI treatments in the US 
 from 1946 - 1961. 
 
 However, in the contacts by members of the public with the Radium Experiment 
 Assessment Project following major news coverage of this issue in the 
 Maryland area in 1997, over 100 out of 1,000 callers to REAP were treated in 
 Maryland into the 1970s. 
 
 The use of NRI was particularly popular in MD because the treatment was 
 developed at Johns Hopkins and popularized there through "hearing loss 
 conservation" programs for schoolchildren run by the State of Maryland, 
Johns 
 Hopkins, and other entities starting in the 1940s. MD residents had the 
 highest per capita use of NRI of any state in the US.  However, the use of 
 NRI did not suddenly end in MD in the early 1960s,  but continued for more 
 than another 10 years for several reasons. Many MD private physicians had 
 been trained at Hopkins and used the procedure long after it generally faded 
 in other parts of the country due to concerns about long-term health effects 
 and the availability of alternate surgical treatments for otitis media in 
 children such as T-tubes. 
 
 Stewart Farber, MSPH
 Director, Radium Experiment Assessment Project >>
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