P107] Risk management of the radiation-induced cataract

Abstract

Purpose The Council Directive 2013/59/EURATOM of 5 December 2013, following the new ICRP guidance, established a considerable reduction on the limit for equivalent dose for the lens of the eye in occupational exposure, from 150 mSv to 20 mSv in a single year. That requires from the Radiation Protection and Prevention Units of the hospitals a new method to evaluate the risk of cataract in exposed professionals and a new guideline to assign PPEs (Personal Protective Equipment) such as lead glasses. The purpose of this work is to propose a method for this task. Methods Our company leads the “Crystalline Project”, manufacturing a new eye lens dosimeter and starting a pilot program with 14 hospitals in Spain, in order to collect data about the accumulated doses in 12 selected medical specialties. Each of the hospitals has participated in the project with a different number of professionals (including doctors, nurses, medical imaging technologists and nursing assistants) during a minimum period of 3 months in a total of 10 months that the project has been running so far. Results The results – expressed in mSv – for the average maximum equivalent dose in a month are: Hemodynamics 2.11, Electrophysiology 0.49, Interventional Neuroradiology 0.88, Interventional Radiology 2.32, Vascular Surgery 1.45, Cardiac Surgery 0.10, Traumatology 0.16, Gastroenterology 1.70, Intensive Care 0.52, Urology 0.20, Anesthesiology 0.10 and Nuclear Medicine (PET) 0.20. Conclusions Our recommendations were based on the Spanish Royal Decree 783/2001 that imposes the obligation of wearing a dosimeter in Controlled Zones, that is, the areas where there exists the possibility of reaching doses of more than 3/10 of the annual occupational limit for the lens of the eye. According to this, every professional that can reach the limit of 6 mSv/year, that is, 0.5 mSv/month, should wear it. If we have a look at the results, we find that those specialties are: Hemodynamics, Interventional Neuroradiology, Interventional Radiology, Vascular Surgery, Gastroenterology and Intensive Care. To make a recommendation on the use of lead glasses, we considered the limit of 1.67 mSv/month (that would make 20 mSv/year), so the resulting specialties were Hemodynamics, Interventional Radiology and Gastroenterology.