Gary,
Thanks for pointing out this article to us. It is another of those that is concerned with electrical wiring (thus very small oscillating magnet fields), and therefore has no obvious correlation to exposures in an NMR facility. Even so, I find the article just the opposite of reassuring.
I am not aware of any similar studies involving exposure to static fields such as encountered in an NMR or MRI facility. If any of you out there in AMMRL know of such a study, please forward the information to the list.
I have read through the original article: De-Kun Li, et al., Epidemiology 13(1), 2002, pg 9-20. The magnetic field exposures are very small: the onset field strength for increased risk is stated as being 16 milliGauss--so the BBC's 1.6 microTesla is not a typo). These fields arise from encounters about the house and work place, i.e., via "daily activity patterns." The magnetic fields are coming from electrical wiring in the home, and perhaps from devices such as vacuum cleaners, electrical heating blankets, etc.
The concern I have is that the exposure level is so much lower that those in our facilities, by at least a factor of 1000! It is not clear to me that I should not make this information available to all female users in my facility. Various people I've discussed this with feel this would cause unnecessary alarm. Any opinions either way from this group?
Thanks,
Charlie
At 03:50 PM 1/9/02 -0500, Gary wrote:
>Probably most of us are not too concerned about working around
>magnetic fields, but BBC News has a comforting article for pregnant
>women working near high magnetic fields. The URL is:
>
>http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/health/newsid_1751000/1751315.stm
>
>The short summary appears to be found in a quote by Dr Savitz:
>
> "Both studies found a reassuring lack of association for
> the most well-established measures of magnetic field
> exposure, that is average magnetic fields."
>
>Gary
>
>_____________________________________________________________________
>
>Gary Strahan, Ph.D. strahan_at_outerbanks.umaryland.edu
>Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences Phone: USA-410-706-3118
>University of Maryland at Baltimore FAX: USA-410-706-0346
>_____________________________________________________________________
>
> This message, including any attached files, is confidential
> and intended only for the addressee. Any unauthorized use,
> redistribution, dissemination of the information, or copying
> of this message is strictly prohibited.
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Charles G. Fry, Ph.D. Tel: (608)262-3182
Director, MR Facility Fax: (608)262-0381
Chem. Dept., Univ. Wisconsin
Madison, WI 53706 USA email: fry_at_chem.wisc.edu
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Received on Thu Jan 10 2002 - 15:19:37 MST