X-Ray Machines

You may find many people who have had a fracture at least once in their life and they might have had to undergo an x-ray to determine where the exact problem is. So what exactly is an x-ray machine and what does it do? How does it get the image of your bones into the brown or gray film? If you don’t know the answers to these questions then it is time to analyze it.First of all, you might know that there are many types of frequencies like the UV frequencies, infrared, the micro wave frequencies and many more. These are distinguished based on the range of frequencies on which they operate. For example, frequencies of about 30GHz are considered to be in the microwave range.The X-rays are frequencies which measure at the range of petahertz and exahertz. These are very ranges indeed, which is why youcan’t see them. The human eye can visualize only the frequencies lying in the spectrum of light. The various changes in frequencies make different colors like red, blue, green, etc and a combination of all the colors give white.The X-rays can pass through your body quite easily but it is not considered as harmful. To make a long story short, when x-rayof your body part is taken, the radiations pass through and fall on a photographic plate or film. Since the bones have high density than rest of the organs and tissues of the body, these appear as white structures on the plate.The bones can clearly be seen on the film and the exact point of the fracture can be located by the medical professional. Of course, it won’t be possible for an inexperienced person to point out a hairline fracture or similar things but by an experiencedeye these can be noticed quite easily. So this is how x-rays are taken.

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X-Rays and Health

X-rays are an important part of the medical field when it comes to determining whether or not people have broken bones, blood clots, tumors, cavities and other medical conditions. X-rays are used commonly across the country by millions of doctors, nurses, and other medical personnel. X-rays have helped to save lives over the past handful of decades by detecting tumors at an early stage. X-rays have also helped doctors determine the proper course of treatment for cancer patients and patients who have broken, shattered, or fractured bones. It is important though for doctors, nurses, and other medical personnel to examine each use of an x-ray on a patient so that the patient is not exposed to a large amount of cumulative radiation during their lifetime.

Hundreds of studies have been conducted over the past couple of decades regarding x-rays and the effect that radiation exposure has on the health of patients. Many of the studies have concluded that exposure to radiation does not increase the risk of developing cancer. Studies have found that there is no difference in the radiation people get from nature and the radiation people are exposed to by x-rays in terms of causing problems within the body or developing cancer. There are, on the other hand, two major hazards caused by exposure to x-rays. The two hazards caused by exposure to x-rays include the following:

• Damage to some cells: only a small amount of cells can be damaged and they will die prematurely.
• Genetic damage to reproductive cells: damage to an ovum in a woman or a sperm cell in a man can lead to a deformed baby or a miscarriage.

The cells in unborn children are growing rapidly, which means that they are incredibly sensitive to radiation from x-rays. The dose of radiation that an unborn child can be subjected to is regulated by United States Federal standards. The standards say that unborn children cannot be exposed to more than 0.5 rem during a nine month pregnancy. In layman’s terms, that number would equate to 10 x-rays during the pregnancy.

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Ultrasounds are for More than Just Babies

Doppler ultrasound analyzer of blood velocity ...
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If you or someone you know has ever been pregnant, you have undoubtedly heard of (and possibly even seen) the use of an ultrasound machine as a method of identifying how well a baby is developing inside of its mother.  An ultrasound involves using very high frequency (extremely high pitched) sound waves, in order to examine in real time what is going on within a body without having to resort to using radioactive waves like x-rays.  A trained physician can tell an awful lot about what is going on inside of a body, using only an ultrasound image.  And ever since the old two dimensional ultrasounds were replaced by three dimensional ones, and even four dimensional versions (where one can see the movement of internal organs and blood, right as it is happening), the field has opened up to an event greater extent.

The ability to evaluate the flow of blood through your body’s veins and arteries is a process referred to as a Doppler ultrasound.  There are three different types of Doppler ultrasound currently in use in the medical field: Color Doppler, Power Doppler, and Spectral Doppler.  Color Doppler uses a computer to turn the various measurements in a group of different colors, so as to visualize the speed and direction that blood flows through any given blood vessel.  Power Doppler provides a more sensitive, detailed read out of the blood flow.  It can not tell the direction of blood flow, however.  Spectral Doppler provides a graphical display of blood flow instead of a visual one, displaying how much distance blood travels per given unit of time.

With all of these sophisticated ultrasound techniques, a lot of information can be figured out.  Symptoms can be quantified, such as pain, swelling and the effects of an infection.  Any internal organ can be checked out, such as the heart, liver, gallbladder, spleen, kidneys, pancreas, bladder, eyes, thyroid, scrotum and various female parts of a patient.  Pretty much any part of a person’s body can be seen in three dimensions, during the exact moment that it is working on doing its thing.

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