%0 Journal Article %A Jeffry A. Siegel %A Charles W. Pennington %A Bill Sacks %T Subjecting Radiological Imaging to the Linear No-Threshold Hypothesis: A Non Sequitur of Non-Trivial Proportion %D 2016 %R 10.2967/jnumed.116.180182 %J Journal of Nuclear Medicine %P jnumed.116.180182 %X Radiological imaging is claimed to carry iatrogenic risk of cancer, based upon an uninformed commitment to the 70-year old linear no-threshold hypothesis (LNTH). Credible evidence of imaging-related low-dose (<100 mGy) carcinogenic risk is nonexistent; it is a hypothetical risk derived from the demonstrably false LNTH. On the contrary, low-dose radiation does not cause, but more likely helps prevent, cancer. The LNTH and its offspring ALARA (as low as reasonably achievable) are fatally flawed, focusing only on molecular damage, while ignoring protective, organismal biological responses. While some grant the absence of low-dose harm, they, nevertheless, advocate the “prudence” of dose optimization (i.e., using ALARA doses); but this is a radiophobia-centered, not scientific, approach. Medical imaging studies achieve a diagnostic purpose and should be governed by the highest science-based principles and policies. The LNTH is an invalidated hypothesis, and its use, in the form of ALARA dosing, is responsible for misguided concerns promoting radiophobia, leading to actual risks far greater than the hypothetical, carcinogenic risk purportedly avoided. Further, the myriad of imaging’s benefits are ignored. The present work calls for ending the radiophobia caused by those asserting the need for dose “optimization” in imaging: medical imaging's low-dose radiation has no documented pathway to harm, while the LNTH and ALARA most assuredly do. %U https://jnm.snmjournals.org/content/jnumed/early/2016/08/03/jnumed.116.180182.full.pdf