Re: Shoe store fluoro units??

["Robert Nowotny" <noworo1@vm.akh-wien.ac.at>]

> Until some time in the 1950's many shoe stores in the US has fluoroscopy
> units that allowed a customer to check the fit of their shoes.
> 
> Someone must have done dosimetry on these units, but I cannot find any
> references.

Richard E. Mould in his book 'A Century of X-rays and Radioactivity 
in Medicine', Institute of Physics Publishing, Bristol, 1993, p.107, 
grants about half a page to the 'pedoskop'. 

He quotes:

Hempelmann LH, Potential dangers in the uncontrolled use of shoe 
fitting fluoroscopes, New England J. Medicine 241, 335-337 (1949)

Williams CR, Radiation exposures from the use of shoe-fitting 
fluoroscopes, New England J. Medicine 241, 333-335 (1949)

Quoted data are: 50 kV, 3-8 mA, 1 mmAl-Filter with a resulting dose 
rate to feet of 0.5-5.8 R/s (typical exposre times of 5-45 s).

------------------------------------------------------
Robert Nowotny
Institut f. Biomed. Technik und Physik, Univ. Wien
AKH-4L, Waehringer Guertel 18-20, A-1090 Wien, Austria
Tel.: +43-1-40400-1988; Fax: +43-1-40400-3988
------------------------------------------------------