IAEA SSG-46 — Radiation Protection and Safety in Medical Uses of Ionizing Radiation (2018)

Table of Contents

1. Source documents

  • Official PDF retained locally — IAEA and joint sponsoring organisations, 2018; retrieved 16 September 2026.
  • Extracted text
  • Provenance and SHA-256 metadata

2. Authority and jurisdiction

  • IAEA Specific Safety Guide explaining how to meet GSR Part 3 requirements in medical uses of ionising radiation.
  • Non-binding international guidance; it does not directly regulate THHS or replace Queensland legislation, licences, standards or the approved RSPP.

3. Key takeaways

  • SSG means Specific Safety Guide: SSG-46 gives practical guidance for applying IAEA radiation-protection requirements as part of good medical practice across radiology, nuclear medicine and radiation therapy.
  • The general framework covers graded regulation, role allocation, competence, management systems and safety assessment.
  • Radiation-therapy guidance spans facility/equipment safety, occupational protection, patient medical exposure, public protection, accident prevention and radioactive-material transport.
  • For patients, robust prescription, identification, calibration, dosimetry, planning, independent checking, QA and recording form a connected safety system.
  • Appendix I turns international incident experience into prevention lessons; exact local tolerances and workflows still require controlled local approval.

4. Summary

4.1. 1 — Introduction

  • Explains background, objective, scope and structure and positions the guide as implementation guidance for GSR Part 3.

4.2. 2 — Framework for medical uses

  • Covers governmental and regulatory responsibilities, a graded approach, roles and responsibilities, education/training/competence, management systems and safety assessment.
  • Paragraphs 2.96 and 2.134 define the medical-facility RPO's occupational/public-protection oversight; the role does not itself carry patient-radiation-protection responsibility or replace medical-physics competence.
  • Paragraphs 2.99–2.100 place medical-physicist dose/risk estimates and prospective constraints before the research ethics committee.

4.3. 3 — Diagnostic radiology and image-guided procedures

  • Gives modality-specific guidance for facility/equipment safety, occupational protection, patient exposure, public protection and accident prevention.

4.4. 4 — Nuclear medicine

  • Addresses facility/equipment, occupational and patient protection, public exposure, accidents and transport for radioactive materials used in nuclear medicine.

4.5. 5 — Radiation therapy

4.5.1. General and facility/equipment safety (paras 5.1–5.92)

  • Addresses multidisciplinary responsibilities, facility design, shielding, equipment safety features, acceptance, commissioning and control after changes or servicing.
  • Paragraphs 5.69–5.70 call for systematic verification of record-and-verify interfaces and data integrity across the radiotherapy network.

4.5.2. Occupational protection (paras 5.93–5.188)

  • Covers controlled/supervised areas, local rules, engineered controls, monitoring, staff competence and source-specific precautions.

4.5.3. Individuals undergoing medical exposure (paras 5.189–5.281)

  • Covers justification, prescription, patient identification, optimisation, calibration and dosimetry, treatment planning/delivery, QA, pregnancy and patient records.
  • Acceptance and commissioning verify interfaces and data transfer before clinical use (paras 5.235–5.236); treatment decisions in pregnancy involve consultation with the patient (para 5.254).
  • Paragraph 5.238 calls for necessary QC after major repair, modification or source replacement and medical-physicist confirmation of safe use before treatment resumes. It supports a local release control without prescribing the RSPP's named workflow.

4.5.4. Public protection, accidents and transport (paras 5.282–5.326)

  • Covers public access/exposure, prevention and mitigation of unintended or accidental exposure, reporting and learning, and transport of radioactive material.
  • Paragraphs 5.274–5.276 distinguish reporting significant events to the regulator from broader voluntary incident learning; paras 5.303–5.304 recommend defence in depth.

4.6. Appendices

Appendix I
Typical causes and contributing factors in accidental medical exposures.
Appendices II–III
Pregnancy avoidance after radiopharmaceutical therapy and cessation of breast-feeding; principally relevant to nuclear medicine.

5. Important definitions, roles, limits and records

Medical exposure
Patient, carer/comforter and research-volunteer exposure within the GSR Part 3 definitions.
Dose constraint
Optimisation tool for occupational/public exposure and specified non-patient medical exposures; not a patient treatment-dose limit.
Radiological medical practitioner, medical radiation technologist and medical physicist
Complementary clinical, delivery and physics responsibilities that require defined competence and communication.
Records
Prescription, identification, plan, calibration, dosimetry, QA, occupational monitoring, maintenance/change, treatment delivery and accidental-exposure investigation records.

6. Practical relationship to the THHS RSPP

  • Strong international implementation basis for the RSPP's facility, equipment, training, patient-pathway, independent-check, QA, incident and HDR controls.
  • Particularly useful for explaining defence in depth and how errors arise across software, data transfer, human action and hardware—not only from the radiation source.
  • Its recommendations should be translated through current Australian and Queensland requirements and locally approved procedures.

7. See Also