• John P McCormick, Stephen J Skehan, Niamh McArdle, and McCormickP AidenPANational Liver Transplant Unit, St Vincent's University Hospital, Donnybrook, Dublin 4, Ireland..
• National Liver Transplant Unit, St Vincent's University Hospital, Donnybrook, Dublin 4, Ireland. john.mc-cormick@ucdconnect.ie.
• Ir J Med Sci. 2022 Oct 1; 191 (5): 2099-2103.

ObjectivesTo evaluate changes in radiation exposure from computed tomography (CT) among patients undergoing liver transplantation in our unit over a 10-year period.MethodsWe evaluated 134 elective patients, without hepatocellular carcinoma or cholangiocarcinoma who underwent transplantation in 2007-2008 and 2017-2018. CT scans performed in our hospital up to 2 years pre transplant and 1 year post transplant were evaluated.ResultsThere was an increase in mean estimated effective radiation dose per patient in 2017-2018 compared to 2007-2008 (77.8 mSv ± 6.2 vs 56.7 mSv ± 5.9, p < 0.05). This change was mainly due to an increased number of pre-transplant CT scans per patient (2.9 ± 0.3 vs 1.4 ± 0.14, p = 0.0001). High radiation dose scan protocols were more frequently used in 2017-2018, with 4-phase liver CT accounting for a larger proportion of scans both pre-transplant (61% vs 43%, p = 0.004) and post-transplant (29% vs 13%, p = 0.002). A greater proportion of patients were exposed to > 100 mSv of ionising radiation in the 2017-2018 patients (29% vs 11%, p < 0.01). These figures are likely to be a significant under-estimate as they exclude other imaging modalities and CT scans performed at other institutions.ConclusionRadiation exposure from diagnostic imaging has increased among liver transplant recipients at our institution over the last decade. This appears to be due to an increase in the number of CT scans performed, and a shift towards higher dose scan protocols.© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland.

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