Levels of occupational external exposure of radiation workers in Hubei province from 2009 to 2018 / 中华放射医学与防护杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To provide a retrospective analysis of the levels of occupational external exposure of radiation workers in Hubei province from 2009 to 2018 in a way to prevent and control its risks.Methods:The external individual doses were surveyed for 50 070 radiation workers between 2009 and 2018 by the effort of the Hubei Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Under the relevant national standards, the external radiation doses to radiation workers were conducted by using TLDs.Results:The average annual collective effective dose to radiation workers in a 10 years period was 1.93 man·Sv, the median of average annual effective dose of 0.14 mSv ( P25- P75 0.06-0.30 mSv), and the average annual effective dose of 0.40 mSv. The annual effective doses received by 46 562 workers were less than 1 mSv, accounting for 92.99% of the total monitored workers. The annual effective dose varied dependent on occupational categories, showing a year-by-year decline trend and staying at a low level after 2012. The relative high radiation doses were seen in nuclear medicine and interventional radiology in medical applications, non-destructive testing and well logging in industrial applications, and other types of radiation applications. Conclusions:The average annual effective dose decreased year in a by year manner and kept at a low level. This indicated that the radiological protection measures taken during the 10 years ensure the health of workers. The continuous monitoring result suggest that much more attention should be paid to such categories workers as nuclear medicine, interventional radiology, non-destructive testing, well logging and others through improving radiation protection measures.