Re: Contamination by Sr-90

[Schoenhofer <schoenho@via.at>]

At 16:05 25.11.1996 -0600, you wrote:
>Can someone provide information on best bioassay technique for Sr-90 
>contamination arising from ingestion?  A person has shown up at a community 
>health clinic claiming to have ingested Sr-90 and now wants to be tested.  
>Unfortunately, in my experience, such persons are not disuaded by information 
>and denials that such contamination could not happen.  This person has other 
>problems that are not associated with the physical body.  According to the 
>information that I have obtained, the person is claiming this ingestion
occurred 
>many months ago.
>
>Is urine and fecal sample analysis still valid at this time?  The only whole 
>body counter that we have available is equipped with NaI crystals, although I 
>suppose we could see some bremsstrahlung from the Y-90.  Any information would 
>be appreciated.
>
>Oh, and by the way, the route of ingestion?  From soft drink cans purchased
and 
>consumed in the United States.  Makes me feel better in the frozen north to
know 
>that we don't add any nasty radioactive material to our Coke! :-)
>
>
>Thanks for your attention to this one!
>
>*************************************
>Regards,
>Peter J. Fundarek
>University of Toronto
>CANADA
>email:  p.fundarek@utoronto.ca
>phone:  (416) 978-2374
>fax:  (416) 971-1384
>*************************************
>--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Peter,

My experience with this kind of persons is that they soon are rather little
interested in the results and in the measurements when they learn about the
costs they will have to pay. 

For serious cases of potential incorporation of Sr-90 urine analysis will be
the method of choice - and it is not cheap. Excretion of Sr-90 is slow, so
one should be able to detect enough Sr-90 in case it was a contamination to
be concerned about. By following the excretion over some months one might
also be able to determine the initial concentration if the time of
contamination would be known. This adds to the costs.....

Good luck!

Franz
Schoenhofer
Habichergasse 31/7
A-1160 WIEN
AUSTRIA/EUROPE
Tel./Fax:	+43-1-4955308
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e-mail:		schoenho@via.at