P-32 Skin Burns

["Sue M. Dupre" <dupre@arundel.Princeton.EDU>]

Good morning!   Several weeks ago, I asked whether any of you had 
experience, personal or anecdotal, with an incident involving P-32 
skin burns - and then I promised to summarize the information I 
received.  I did not pursue details of any of the responses I received. 
So finally, the promised summary:

Several RADSAFERS described P-32 skin contamination incidents, 
none of which produced skin burns.  

Two RADSAFE members reported that they had been told about P-32 
burns received in the past by researchers.  In one case a researcher
told the RSO that, as a graduate student in another country,  he had
received hand, finger and retinal burns while using P-32 in multi-10s 
of millicurie amounts.  In another case a RADSAFER who was doing 
training at another institution, not his own, said that a researcher 
came up and showed him a red patch on his skin which he said was 
produced by P-32 contamination a few weeks earlier. 

A RADSAFE reader described a minor skin burn he/she received years
before as a Nuclear Med Tech during an attempt to perform an IV 
administration of a therapy dose of 30 mCi of P-32, during which the 
syringe/shield broke.

Finally, one person described an Mo-99 incident at their institution in 
which a skin lesion was produced and was probably the combined 
effect of acid and radiation.

It was clear to me that my respondents acknowledged the possibility 
of a scenario in which undetected P-32 contamination could produce 
skin effects but no one reported a clearly documented case of a P-32 
skin burn occurring in a research environment. Many thanks to those of 
you who took the time to respond to me!

Sue M. Dupre, Health Physicist

Office of Occupational Health and Safety
Chemical Sciences Building/Forrestal Campus
Princeton University
Princeton, NJ  08544-0710

E-mail: dupre@arundel.princeton.edu
Phone:  (609) 258-6252
Fax:    (609) 258-1804

See the OHS Web site at http://www.princeton.edu/~ehs