Unethical human experimentation in the United States
In 1953, the AEC ran several studies at the University of Iowa on the health effects of radioactive iodine in newborns and pregnant women. In one study, researchers gave pregnant women from of iodine-131, in order to study the women's aborted embryos in an attempt to discover at what stage, and to what extent, radioactive iodine crosses the placental barrier. In another study, they gave 25 newborn babies (who were under 36 hours old and weighed from ) iodine-131, either by oral administration or through an injection, so that they could measure the amount of iodine in their thyroid glands, as iodine would go to that gland.
Iodine-123
Dosing can vary; is recommended for thyroid imaging while an uptake test may use . There is a study that indicates a given dose can effectively result in effects of an otherwise higher dose, due to impurities in the preparation. The dose of radioiodine I is typically tolerated by individuals who cannot tolerate contrast mediums containing larger doses of iodine such as used in CT scan, intravenous pyelogram (IVP) and similar imaging diagnostic procedures. Iodine is not an allergen.