Considerations concerning the use of counting active personal dosimeters in pulsed fields of ionising radiation

Active personal electronic dosimeters (APDs) exhibit limitations in pulsed radiation fields, which cannot be overcome without the use of new detection technology. As an interim solution, this paper proposes a method by which some conventional dosimeters can be operated in a way such that, based on the basic knowledge about the pulsed radiation field, any dosimetric failure of the dosimeter is signalised by the instrument itself. This method is not applicable to all combinations of APD and pulsed radiation field. The necessary requirements for the APD and for the parameters of the pulsed radiation field are given in the paper. Up to now, all such requirements for APDs have not been tested or verified in a type test. The suitability of the method is verified for the use of one APD used in two clinical pulsed fields.