Published on
Newly proposed legislation in Arizona aims to regulate radiation safety beyond the current federal and state standards, according to AZ Mirror. Proponents say the package represents a first-in-the-nation push focused on “radiation protection systems” for interventional x-ray. For example, it requires hospitals performing real-time x-ray procedures to install enhanced protection systems in at least 50% of their procedure rooms by July 2027, and the system must include shielding that offers protection equivalent to or better than a 0.25 mm lead-equivalent apron as well as real-time dosimetry to track staff radiation exposure live during procedures. Interventional x-ray with its real-time imaging is typically used for minimally invasive treatment procedures—significantly different than the traditional x-ray imaging used for diagnosis in nearly every urgent care.
“We must ensure regulators do not conflate the extreme risks of interventional labs with the negligible scatter of urgent care,” says Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc, President of Urgent Care Consultants and Senior Editor of JUCM. “If we allow standards designed for 50,000 exposures a year to bleed into general radiography, we risk mandating expensive solutions for a nonexistent problem—ultimately creating new financial barriers that reduce community access to basic healthcare.”Costly shift: If passed, the Arizona legislation would directly impact facility design, capital equipment costs, and safety protocols for x-ray. According to Ayers, it also sets a new precedent for occupational safety standards that could eventually be integrated into other states or other radiographic settings, including urgent care. Additionally, the enhanced protection standards are a major shift from monitoring radiation exposure (eg, passive badges) to actively reducing it (eg, mandated shielding systems), he says.