II. Results of Clinical and Laboratory Examinations

Physical and laboratory examinations were done on 319 persons who had been treated by x-ray epilation for tinea capitis a decade earlier, as well as 127 patients with nonirradiated tinea capitis and 158 nontinea, nonirradiated controls. The examinations were done as part of a program to characterize the nature and magnitude of chronic radiation damage with respect to the radiation exposures to the various structures of the head resulting from the Adamson-Kienbock x-ray epilation procedure. Scalp doses of 500 to 800 rads were found to have caused a 20% incidence of generalized diminution of the hair population of the scalp, which was due to a combined reduction in the number and diameter of the hair. No definite evidence of auditory radiation damage was found to be associated with doses of 70 rads to the ear. A slight but definite increase in the incidence of posterior subcapsular opacities of minimal severity was found to be associated with a dose to the eye of 50 rads.