Comment by verisimi | Hacker News Reader

Comment by verisimi | Hacker News Reader

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What I am saying that it is agreed that ultrasound does have an impact.

The failure in the provision of evidence, is with those that claim it is safe. Its not for me to prove it is harmful.

Ask yourself, how can a treatment that breaks kidney stones or burn tumours also be 'safe'? It may be that the impact is negligible, but that is not safe. In the womb especially, a slight impact may have a large effect on a growing foetus.

Ask yourself too, what level of radiation is safe? How much microwaving? Is any?

So am I fearmongering, or is this a valid concern? I think it is clearly a valid concern. I do not simply accept medical consensus over the reasoning of my own mind.

I can see use cases where the information that is provided by ultrasound is useful and outweighs the risk. I think that casual, repeated usage of ultrasound for pregnant women, for the 'gender reveal'/colour scans or whatever, with powerful machines, is ill advised though. I don't recommend anyone undertake any unnecessary medical procedures.

I also think that an adult that has awareness of the scope of a potential impact, can do what they want - its their choice to do as they want. I object to inflicting avoidable harm (albeit the harm might not be obvious) to individuals that cannot consent - eg infants, foetuses.

FWIW, I do have kids, and - to my regret - I did scan them before they were born. I wouldn't do it now, knowing what I do.

> Ask yourself, how can a treatment that breaks kidney stones or burn tumours also be 'safe'?

The same way taking a bath can be safe, but a tsunami is not.

Or that there's a difference between a bath in 37C water and a bath in 100C wather.

>FWIW, I do have kids, and - to my regret - I did scan them before they were born. I wouldn't do it now, knowing what I do.

Why are you acting like you have scientific consensus behind what you're saying? There is literally zero proof of anything you're claiming.

>So am I fearmongering, or is this a valid concern?

You're fearmongering. That's it. Nothing else. It's the same kind of attitude that has led to such a self-important, 'I know better than doctors' attitude about vaccines.

Sound waves have an impact. Too loud and it can permanently damage your hearing. What level of audio volume is safe?

Water has an impact on your body. Drink too much and it can harm you. What amount of water is safe?

etc., etc.

The technology enables us to learn and prevent so many problems, that to write it off just because at extreme levels it can be harmful is foolish.

And it's fearmongering to make that claim without evidence. See the summary here:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3262273/

> The first mention that ultrasound could be used to produce images of the foetal head was probably in a lecture given by Ian Donald in 1959. Since that time, the use of ultrasound in obstetrics has grown rapidly, and has a generally accepted excellent safety record. However, it is impossible to prove zero risk, and the absence of evidence of harm should not be taken as evidence of absence of harm. The epidemiological evidence that exists is reassuring as to the safety of routine ultrasound scanning, but of necessity it only includes subjects who were imaged with devices that were state of the art at the time (mostly early 1980s). No pulsed Doppler or colour flow examinations are included, and the output from modern ultrasound scanners is considerably higher today than it was at that time. It is, therefore, essential to remain vigilant, and to assess new technologies and applications from a safety aspect as they arise.

So TL;DR: Ultrasound is safe, the benefits outweigh the risks by a large margin, and we should always insist that Ultrasound, and any modern medical technology is held to rigorous scientific testing standards.

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