An Investigation to Determine an Optimum Protective Garment Material in Nuclear Medicine

AIM: The aim of this study is to find an optimum material to protect garment for protection against (99)T(cm) radionuclide. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Monte Carlo simulation code was applied to investigate radiation attenuation of 13 shielding materials including: Ba, gray Sn, white Sn, Sb, Bi, Bi(2)O(3), BaSO(4), Sn/W, Sb/W, Pb and W with thicknesses of 0.5 and 1 mm to determine an optimum protective garment material in nuclear medicine against (99)Tc(m). Furthermore, the dose enhancement on the staff body was investigated for shielding materials such as tungsten and lead. RESULTS: The findings of the simulations show that the maximum and minimum attenuation obtained with thicknesses of 1 mm W and 1 mm BaSO(4) were 96.46% and 14.2%, respectively. The results also demonstrate that tungsten does not cause any dose enhancement on staff body but this is not true for lead. Tungsten provides the highest radiation attenuation without dose enhancement on the body of staff. CONCLUSION: Among materials evaluated, tungsten is the optimum material and it can be applied for the design of protective garment for nuclear medicine staff against (99)Tc(m).