The report found cancer risk grew with each scan received, and there was an elevated risk even in those who received only one CT, also known as a CAT scan.

WSJ: Childhood CT Scans Pose Cancer Risk

What you get back from the scan is a report showing the risk you run, relative to the average, of contracting the various conditions tracked.

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In Wednesday's study, patients who already had cancer diagnoses or who developed cancer within two years of a CT scan were excluded, to decrease the likelihood that risk calculations would be inflated by patients who would have developed cancer without getting a CT scan.

WSJ: Childhood CT Scans Pose Cancer Risk

The coronary CT scan is designed for low to intermediate risk patients, when applied as a triage tool in the ER.

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The fund's stock-picking process includes a scan of companies growing faster than their peers, a risk evaluation of balance sheets and the stability of cash flows, and a hard look at valuation, to see if a stock is worth the price.

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And others are coming on the market that scan all 500, 000 genetic variants to give an individual a picture of their risk of several diseases at once.

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To avoid that issue, Dr. Muller envisions the technology as part of a strategy in which people would first be identified as at risk through a genetic test and a noninvasive imaging test such as a CT scan before being referred for the spectroscopy analysis.

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The increased risk corresponded to one additional case of leukemia in the 10 years after the first scan for every 10, 000 patients younger than 10 who were scanned, or to an extra case of brain cancer for every 30, 000 such people scanned.

WSJ: Childhood CT Scans Pose Cancer Risk