Response of TLD and RPL personal dosimeters in a national inter-comparison test program

Background: Different kinds and models of personal dosimeters are used in individual monitoring by workers. Performance testing as part of approval procedures is carried out to demonstrate that the essential performance specifications are routinely maintained. There are four service providers in Iran which use different luminescence techniques (i. e. TLD and RPL) with various kinds of dosimeter materials/reader instruments in personal dosimetry services. Materials and Methods: A national performance approval tests program was performed for the dosimeters of the service providers in energy range of soft, 660 keV and 1.25 MeV, at the doses values around the recoding, investigation and annual dose limits, and different angle of incidents (e. g. 0, 20, 40 and 60 degree). Results: The results of this testing satisfies the overall accuracy criteria with 95% confidence levels specified by the ICRP, except that of RPL technique in low energy which overestimates the dose out of the acceptable accuracy band defined as the ICRP trumpet curves. Conclusion: The intercomparison has proved that the personal dose equivalent quantity, Hp(10), defined by the ICRU and recommended by the IAEA are becoming widely accepted and implemented in most participated laboratories.