Radiation safety

Radiation protection, sometimes known as radiological protection, is defined by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as "The protection of people from harmful effects of exposure to ionizing radiation, and the means for achieving this". The IAEA also states "The accepted understanding of the term radiation protection is restricted to protection of people. Suggestions to extend the definition to include the protection of non-human species or the protection of the environment are controversial". Exposure can be from a radiation source external to the human body or due to an intake of radioactive material into the body.

Ionizing radiation is widely used in industry and medicine, and can present a significant health hazard. It causes microscopic damage to living tissue, which can result in skin burns and radiation sickness at high exposures (known as "tissue" or "deterministic" effects), and statistically elevated risks of cancer at low exposures (" effects").

Fundamental to radiation protection is the reduction of expected dose and the measurement of human dose uptake. For radiation protection and dosimetry assessment the International Committee on Radiation Protection (ICRP) and International Commission on Radiation Units and Measurements (ICRU) have published recommendations and data which is used to calculate the biological effects on the human body, and set regulatory and guidance limits.

The ICRP recommends, develops and maintains the International System of Radiological Protection based on evaluation of the body of scientific studies available. The recommendations it makes flow down to national regulators, which have the opportunity to incorporate them into law. This is shown in the accompanying diagram.

In most countries a national regulatory authority works towards ensuring a secure radiation environment in society by setting dose limitation requirements that are generally based on the recommendations of the ICRP. These use the following overall principles:

There are three factors that control the amount, or dose, of radiation received from a source. Radiation exposure can be managed by a combination of these factors:

Internal dose can result in effects or deterministic effects such as radiation poisoning, depending on the amount of radioactive material ingested and other biokinetic factors. A committed dose from a low level internal source represents the same risk as the same amount of external effective dose.

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