Dose equivalent quantities in the ICRU sphere

Abstract

Williams et al. (ibid., vol.29, no.4, p.458-61, 1984) have discussed the difficulties in data comparison when different fluence to absorbed dose to air conversion factors are used. To avoid the difficulties of comparing calculations which employ different conversion factors Dimbylow et al. suggest that one should normalise dose equivalents to fluence. In fact this is the primary quantity that is calculated, i.e. the dose equivalent for a given number of histories. If one then wishes to convert to dose equivalent per unit absorbed dose in air the calculated values of dose equivalent per unit fluence are divided by the value of the absorbed dose to air per unit fluence. Therefore the differences between the present authors previous results and those of Williams et al. cannot be attributed to the use of different conversion factors.