Comparison of four methods used in determination of secondary shielding requirements for a teletherapy facility: a case study of 137Cs room in Tanzania

The performance of four methods often used to calculate the secondary barrier requirements is evaluated for a typical 137Cs-therapy room as a case study. The first two methods are provided by the NCRP49 and IAEA and both consider the influence of the primary, leakage and scattered radiation at a point as corrected for the workload, use and occupancy factors. A different shielding model encompasses the third method, which determines the doses as corrected for build-up effects assuming the narrow beam geometry. The fourth method is based on the calculation of the dose rates from the source activity with a relevant gamma constant. In all four methods, an appropriate transmission factor for the protective barrier in question is applied. The results show that for controlled area, the similarity in the calculated thicknesses using all four methods was nearly within 50%. For uncontrolled areas, a significant difference of magnitude up to a factor of 2.4 was found, which is mainly attributed to the non-consideration of occupancy factors in the latter two methods. Nevertheless, the non-agreement is useful to validate the specific assumptions taken for the employed shielding method. Despite being slightly high, it is concluded that the current shielding methods based on NCRP fundamentals are satisfactorily optimal in planning new therapy facilities. However for existing facilities, such as those undesigned according to the standard requirements, the combination of the four different methods with the dose rate measurements tend to offer a better cost effective shielding option. Retrospectively, additional 41-cm thick concrete is recommended for the unshielded southern barrier of the 137Cs room. Interestingly, the recommended thickness agrees to within ±5% with that estimated by using the recently recommended method by IAEA.