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Evaluation of RESRAD-BUILD and MicroShield codes for the simulation of small accident scenarios in nuclear medicine therapy patients’ rooms

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Abstract

Computational methods in nuclear medicine therapy can be very useful for estimating the external dose in non-routine situations when conventional dosimeters may be inadequate or unavailable. Monte Carlo techniques provide the most accurate approach when it comes to model complex scenarios, but they are time and machine resource consuming. In this work we explore the alternative of using two fast and interactive deterministic codes, RESRAD-BUILD and MicroShield, primarily designed for radiation protection purposes, to calculate the dose in small, simple accidental scenarios, and benchmarked them with two Monte Carlo simulation tools, MCNP6 and Geant4. The absorbed dose rate in air computed by RESRAD-BUILD and compared to MicroShield showed a mean ratio of 1.01 ± 0.04 for Lu-177 and 0.99 ± 0.04 in the case of a point source and within 25% for an area source. When compared to MCNP6 and Geant4, the results revealed an overall agreement among the codes, showing a deviation below 30% in most cases, with a few exceptions that are discussed. We also propose a preliminary approach for easy modeling of patient's organs to calculate the external dose from routine therapies with deterministic methods. The suitability and limitation of these models are presented and discussed for some common applications.

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Data availability statement

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author or the first author on reasonable request.

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Funding

The SIREN project is funded by the Activity Plan for Scientific Research 2019–2021 of the Italian National Institute for Insurance against Accidents at Work (INAIL), grant BRIC 2019, themes ID n.44/2019.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Core Facilities, Istituto Superiore Di Sanità, Viale Regina Elena 299, 00161, Rome, Italy

    Giorgia Stendardo & Paola Fattibene

  2. National Center for Innovation Technology in Public Health, Istituto Superiore di Sanità, Viale Regina Elena 299, 00161, Rome, Italy

    Giorgia Stendardo

  3. DIT, INAIL, Via Torraccio Di Torrenova 7, 00133, Rome, Italy

    Claudio Andenna & Carmine Zicari

  4. Radiation Protection Institute, ENEA, Via Martiri Di Monte Sole 4, 40129, Bologna, Italy

    Paolo Ferrari

  5. National Center for Radiation Protection and Computational Physics, Istituto Superiore Di Sanità, Viale Regina Elena 299, 00161, Rome, Italy

    Cristina Nuccetelli & Gennaro Venoso

Authors
  1. Giorgia Stendardo
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  2. Claudio Andenna
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  3. Paola Fattibene
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  4. Paolo Ferrari
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  5. Cristina Nuccetelli
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  6. Gennaro Venoso
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  7. Carmine Zicari
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Contributions

GS and PF conceived and planned the experiments. GS, CA, GV, CN and PF planned, carried out and interpreted the results of the simulations. GS, PF, CA, CZ performed the comparative analysis, and GS, PF, CZ took the lead in writing the manuscript in consultation with all Authors. All authors provided critical feedback and helped shape the research, analysis and manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Paola Fattibene.

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The authors declare that they have no conflicting interests.

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Stendardo, G., Andenna, C., Fattibene, P. et al. Evaluation of RESRAD-BUILD and MicroShield codes for the simulation of small accident scenarios in nuclear medicine therapy patients’ rooms. Eur. Phys. J. Plus 139, 347 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-024-05096-0

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