Mobile phones should not be used in clinical areas or within a metre of medical equipment in hospitals

Abstract

Question Does electromagnetic radiation emitted by mobile phones cause clinically relevant interference with medical equipment used to monitor or treat patients in hospital? Study design Systematic review. Main results Seven studies met inclusion criteria. Twenty-nine categories of medical equipment were tested. Fourteen of the 457 devices tested at 1800 MHz and 45 of the 479 devices tested at 900 MHz experienced electromagnetic interference. At 900 MHz, clinically relevant interference occurred at a maximum distance between 5 cm and 200 cm depending on the device. At 1800 MHz, clinically relevant interference occurred at a maximum distance between 5 cm and 80 cm depending on the device. However, neither frequency caused consistent interference with any of the 29 categories of equipment investigated. The two largest studies reported that electromagnetic interference affected 23–53% of medical devices, and that about 10% of this interference was likely to endanger patients. Authors’ conclusions Mobile phone use should be restricted in hospitals, particularly in clinical areas and within 1 metre of medical devices.