Answer to Question #1888 Submitted to "Ask the Experts"

Q

I recently went to the dentist for a check-up exam and had four digital bitewing x rays. I wore a lead apron while they were being taken, and I was having my period at the time of the x rays. I am 34 years old, and I am going to try to get pregnant soon. I am wondering if I should wait a few months before trying to conceive so any radiation may leave my body? And I am wondering if there is any radiation damage to my eggs from these x rays?

A

Dental x-ray exposures with the use of a lead apron on your part does not expose your ovaries to any reproductive, clinically significant dose of radiation. If you wait three months, even that low exposure would become even less significant. I understand your concern and I will try to explain why your anxiety and concern is not warranted in your present situation. When you receive a diagnostic x ray study of your head, teeth, chest, arms, or legs at a qualified facility, the exposure of the x rays is not to your ovaries. The "scatter" that might reach the ovaries would be extremely small and would not represent an increased risk for birth defects or miscarriage in a future pregnancy. The most important characteristic of x rays that concerns us is the dose. You may not know that we ourselves are radioactive and we are exposed to many sources of natural radiation that we cannot avoid. Your ovaries did not receive a dose that would result in any measurable increased reproductive risk. If you are healthy and young and have no reproductive problems or family history of reproductive problems your risk for birth defects is 3% and for miscarriage, 15%. Neither you nor I can change that risk which all mothers have when they begin a pregnancy. Good luck with your pregnancy. Robert L. Brent, MD, PhD