Radiation Protection Dosimetry Advance Access originally published online on February 29, 2008
Radiation Protection Dosimetry 2008 129(1-3):3-5; doi:10.1093/rpd/ncn019
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The SENTINEL project
1 Unit 9 Kingfisher Way, Silverlink Business Park, Wallsend, NE28 9ND, UK
2 Garden Hill House, St James's Hospital, Dublin 8, Ireland
3 Complutense University, 28040 Madrid, Spain
4 Ospedale S. Maria Della Misericordia, 33100 Udine, Italy
5 Institute of Radiology, Nordallee 1, D-54292 Trier, Germany
6 Radiation and Isotopes for Health, Delft University of Technology, Mekelweg 15, 2629 JB Delft, The Netherlands
7 UZ Gasthuisberg, Herestraat 49, B 3000 Leuven, Belgium
* Corresponding author: keith.faulkner{at}nhs.net
Health-care expenditure on radiological equipment in Europe is a growing fraction of the gross domestic product for all member states. This increase in expenditure has been driven by technical developments in equipment design, matched by the introduction of novel clinical practices, examinations and procedures. The radiation protection implications of these developments have to be assessed. The SENTINEL co-ordination action covered radiation protection, safety and related issues that arise from these technical and clinical developments. SENTINEL covered 90% of patient examinations in European Radiology, 60% of the collective dose from medical sources and 
50% of the collective dose to European citizens from man-made sources. The SENTINEL co-ordination actions ‘main’ objective was to address the safety and efficacy issues which are common to all digital diagnostic imaging systems, including nuclear medicine. High-dose procedures and sensitive groups (such as children) were covered by the project. Specifically, the co-ordination action aimed: (1) to establish both physical and clinical image quality criteria and link the two, (2) to undertake a series of dosimetry studies to establish the reference levels for new procedures and (3) to develop good practice guidelines for radiation protection in digital imaging and produce training material.