Comparison of surface contamination monitors for in vivo measurement of ¹³¹I in thyroid

The routine handling of radiopharmaceuticals in nuclear medicine represents a significant risk of internal exposure to the staff. The IAEA recommends the implementation of monitoring plans for all workers subject to a risk of exposures above 1 mSv per year. However, in Brazil, such recommendation is practically unfeasible due to the lack of a sufficient number of qualified internal dosimetry services over the country. This work presents an alternative based on a simple and inexpensive methodology aimed to perform in-vivo monitoring of ¹³¹I in thyroid using portable surface contamination probes. All models evaluated showed suitable sensitivity for such application. (author)