Assessment Of Radiation Exposure Of Diagnostic X-rays Among Patients And Personnel

Background: Medical diagnostic radiation is manmade sources of exposure in medical practices.rnIonizing radiation yields known health hazard that may vary from skin burn to cancer or death. InrnEthiopia, health facilities are growing in number with the increasing facility of radiology services.rnHowever, the number of personnel, the provision of spare part of machine, quality assurance andrnother aspect has not grown with demand of safety.rnObjectives: The study was designed to assess the status of radiation exposure due to diagnostic xraysrnamong patients and personnel.rnMethods: Cross-sectional study was carried out in 43 functional diagnostic x-ray institutions fromrnJanuary to February 2005 in Addis Ababa. A total of 215 patients who were examined for chestrnposterior-anterior (PA) were randomly selected. In addition, all radiology personnel who had dosernreport of the year 2004 were the study subjects. National Radiation Protection Authority completedrnradiation surveillance and quality control records of institutions were also considered.rnResults: The mean (SD) skin entrance dose of patients was 1.877(1.546) mSv. Out of the total 215rnpatients, 206(95.8%) of patients’ shallow dose and 191(88.8%) patients entrance deep dose wererngreater than 0.4mSv. The annual mean (SD) skin entrance dose for radiology personnel was foundrnto be 0.407(0.225) mSv. According to records analysis of the National Radiation ProtectionrnAuthority quality control, 15(19.2%), 13(16.7%) and 17(21.8%) of institutions machines wererndeviated with in unacceptable range in their generator voltage, the machines timer and, theirrncollimation and beam alignment respectively. Multi variate analysis indicated that exposure settingrnv i i irngreater than 25mAS [OR= 3.141; 95% CI = (1.170-8.432)] had impact on patients’ received dose tornbe high.rnConclusion: Adult patients examined for chest-PA entrance dose was abnormally high. Thus, greatrnefforts will be expected from different sectors of the country in order to bring the patients receivedrndose for specified radiological procedure to minimum level.

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