Can a pregnant woman have a CT scan safely?

It won't harm the pregnant woman. It WILL, however, hurt your unborn fetus. Depending how far along you are in your pregnancy and which body part is imaged will determine how much it will possibly interfere with your fetus' development.

For example, if you were to get a CT scan of your brain, then your abdomen area would be shielded and your baby would be pretty well protected from any errant radiation as it is not in the primary radiation beam.

If you were to get a CT scan of your abdomen, however, this would more than likely only happen in an extreme emergency situation as the dose to your unborn fetus would be great and it would surely disrupt his development. To what degree, no one really knows. It would also depend on how many weeks pregnant you are. The farther along that you are, the better the outcome in lessening your chance of significant damage to your unborn child. Radiation DOES kill cells. While we can regrow cells, sometimes (in development) those cells cannot be replaced if they were being formed at a critical time in the babies development.

Any radiation study being requested on a pregnant female should always be questioned as to the importance of the study and can any other test be done first. You and your doctor must outweigh the risks and benefits before undergoing a radiation test while pregnant.