A protocol for the calibration of gamma cameras to estimate internal contamination in emergency situations

BARIO

RADIOISOTOPOS

CAMARA DE CENTELLEO

RADIOQUIMICA

BIBLIOGRAFIA NACIONAL QUIMICA

2007

The increasing concern about accidents involving radioactive materials has led to the search of alternative methods to quickly identify and quantify radionuclides in workers and in the population. One of the options to face up an eventual demand for mass monitoring of internal contamination is the use of a nuclear medicine diagnostic equipment known as gamma camera, a device used to scan patients who have been administered specific amounts of radioactive materials for medical purposes. The components of a gamma camera are the collimator, detector crystal, photomultiplier tube array, position logic circuits, and the data analysis computer. A Thallium-activated Sodium Iodide [NaI (Tl)] detector crystal is generally used in Gamma cameras. This is due to this crystal's optimal detection efficiency for the gamma ray energies of radionuclide emission common to Nuclear Medicine. Although the gamma camera is used for image diagnosis it can be calibrated with anthropomorphic phantoms or point sources for the quantification of radionuclide activities in the human body. Therefore, a wide range of radioactive materials can be detected by means of this technique. This work presents a protocol for the calibration of gamma cameras for such application. In order to evaluate the suitability of this type of equipment, a gamma camera available in a public hospital located in Rio de Janeiro was calibrated for the in vivo measurement of 131I. The calibration includes the determination of detection efficiencies and minimum detectable activities for each radionuclide. The results show that the gamma camera presents enough sensitivity to detect activity levels corresponding to effective doses bellow 1 mSv. The protocol is the basis to establish a network of nuclear medicine centers, located in public hospitals in 8 countries of South America (Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Chile, Mexico, Peru, Uruguay) and in Spain that could be requested to collaborate in remediation actions in the event of an accident involving incorporation of radioactive materials. This protocol is one of the most significant outputs of the IAEA-ARCAL Project (RLA/9/049-LXXVIII) aimed to the Harmonization of Internal Dosimetry Procedures

Radiation Protection Dosimetry v. 127, no. 1-4, 2007. -- p. 253-257

Oxford University Press

2007

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DOI: 10.1093/rpd/ncm278