Optimization of radiation protection of medical personnel during the CT guided interventional procedures
Abstract
Interventional procedures guided by CT are one of the most dangerous from the aspect of radiation protection. The radiologist performing interventional procedures must stand very close to CT scanner.
Moreover, during some of the interventional procedures the radiologist has to hold his hand directly in the CT scanner beam. To acquire the radiation dose data needed for radiation protection analysis, various types of detectors and monitoring locations were used.
Countermeasures like modifications of exposition parameters, the usage of CT scanner construction as shielding during the CT fluoroscopy, the education of technologists with an emphasis on software protection and others were presented and implemented to optimize the radiation protection of radiologists performing interventional procedures guided by CT fluoroscopy. From the data collected, the efficiency of implemented countermeasures was calculated.
The average hand radiation dose during the PRT (L5/S1) intervention of interventional radiologists was decreased by 57% from 41.0 µSv to 17.6 µSv. The average hand radiation dose of interventional radiologists was decreased by 76% from 5.0 µSv to 1.2 µSv.