Juan Palomar, MD trained in Spain and the United States, becoming an early pioneer in Pediatric Urology. For five decades, he treated infants and adults using fluoroscopy for complex urological conditions — work that exposed him to scatter ionizing radiation, especially during procedures like cystoscopy and ureteroscopy where the surgeon sits on a stool in the operating room positioned between the patient's legs, often only a foot or two from the fluoroscopy tube. In pediatric cases, particularly with infants, that distance can shrink to just inches. His exposures occurred at a time when protective standards were inadequate and these standards remain outdated even today.
In 2017, Juan was diagnosed with an extremely aggressive, chordoma in the center of his brain. He knew immediately that it was due to decades of ionizing radiation exposure from fluoroscopy. Despite extensive treatment, he died 11 months later, leaving behind his wife, young daughter, and a community who loved him. His story mirrors a long-standing pattern among physicians in Urology and other fluoroscopy-dependent specialties who continue to face preventable scatter ionizing radiation exposure due to insufficient safety standards. Their losses reveal a preventable occupational hazard that demands urgent attention.
