Marshall Brain's Blog

After reading this article in PopSci, the idea of a full-body CT scan actually sounded like fun:

Me, from top to bottom

The author points out:

The results, when they come, consist of 172 black-and-white cross sections of my body on a CD-ROM disc, and a written report....

I learn that the scan finds my heart's pathways open, my lungs and sinuses clear, my spine and bones normal, and my liver, kidneys, spleen, and pancreas all in surprisingly good shape....

The next day's doctor-patient chat is reassuring. The physician tells me that the nodes in my neck don't present a problem, and are likely the result of an old throat infection or even dental problems. With a heart like mine, "You can eat steak tonight." By the way, I ask him, do you ever find anything bad with the self-scan patient? "We find two or three tumors a week," he says.

I have a friend who says that a mall near him has a "CT scan store" because the scans have become so popular in his city.

Alas, there is a downside:

Full-body CT scans pose high cancer risk

According to the article:

Just one of these scans imparts a dose of radiation comparable to that received by some Japanese atomic-bomb survivors, while repeated annual screenings carry a significantly elevated lifetime cancer risk, the study found. The researchers said that among otherwise healthy 45-year-olds, one full-body screening would typically cause a fatal form of cancer in 1 of every 1,200 people.