Entrance surface dose of digital radiography adult examinees in a grade A tertiary hospital in Shanghai

Abstract

ObjectiveTo investigate the entrance surface dose （ESD） of digital radiography （DR）adult examinees in a grade A tertiary hospital in Shanghai， to analyze the dose level of the DR adult examinees， and to provide data for the development of DR typical dose reference.MethodsA DR equipment in the hospital was selected and the irradiation parameters and dose were determined in two randomly selected age groups （15‒39 years and 40‒69 years） of DR adult examinees. The examinations included chest PA， chest LAT， abdominal AP， pelvic AP， lumbar AP， lumbar LAT， thoracic AP， and thoracic LAT. The number of examinees in each exposure position was 20. ESD and effective dose were calculated for each age group and each position.ResultsA total of 320 examinees were investigated. The 75th percentiles of ESD in different exposure positions were as follows： chest PA 0.19 mGy；chest LAT 0.96 mGy；abdominal AP 3.63 mGy；pelvic AP 3.16 mGy；lumbar AP 9.27 mGy；lumbar LAT 18.29 mGy；thoracic AP 6.85 mGy；and thoracic LAT 13.40 mGy.ConclusionsThe differences between the estimated ESD and effective dose were large in different exposure positions、in the same exposure positions、and in the same positions with different exposure types， and there were statistically significant differences in ESD of examinees with different exposure positions. The estimated typical values of different exposure positions were apparently lower than the diagnostic reference level.

Keywords

• digital radiography
• adult examinee
• entrance surface dose
• effective dose