A method for skin hand exposure by positrons during handling of ¹⁸F-FDG radiopharmaceutical

By handling with radiopharmaceutical local irradiation of skin on hands of nearly 20% workers in nuclear medicine is likely to reach more than the legal dose limit for the skin. During syringe preparation and administration of positron radiopharmaceutical ¹⁸F-FDG to patients there are operations that can lead to hand irradiation by positrons. At present, there is insufficient data available about the positron exposure of the hands, which would serve as a basis for the optimization of procedures, including the preparation and administration of positron radiopharmaceuticals. This deficiency impedes the improvement of protective shielding of relevant tools against positrons and the availability of more accurate specifications of the distribution of local exposure of the skin of hands. Presented method of positron dose evaluation is based on pair of TLDs MCP-7 and MCP-Ns with different detection sensitivity to positrons and photons. Detection sensitivities of TLD MCP-Ns and MCP-7 were calculated by Monte Carlo code MCNPX 2.7 in units of skin dose equivalent Hp(0,07).Experimentally has been verified decreasing of skin dose by about factor 5 if positron source ¹⁸F-FDG in syringe, or infusion tube is shielded by a simple additional local shielding from 1 mm polyethylene foil. (authors)