How to establish and use local diagnostic reference levels: an ESR EuroSafe Imaging expert statement

Although the Diagnostic Reference Levels (DRLs) have been shown to be an important tool for optimising patient radiation protection, there are still difficulties related to the methodology that should be used to establish and use local DRL values. This statement represents the current view of the EuroSafe Imaging ‘Clinical DRLs’ working group formed with the purpose to produce scientific and educational material on DRLs and promote the concept of local DRLs. Guidelines on how to establish and how to use local DRLs presented herein can be implemented using a multidisciplinary team approach. Local DRLs are easy to determine and implement and they reflect local equipment performance and local clinical needs. They can be updated more frequently than the national DRLs, especially if a dose management system is available. To establish local DRLs, a practical approach could be to collect a reasonable set, i.e., at least 20–30 procedures, of data for well-defined clinical indications and calculate the 3rd quartile values. The median values of the distribution can be set to define the ‘typical values’. The International Commission of Radiological Protection (ICRP) suggests setting ‘typical values’ for newer technologies that enable decreased amounts of radiation exposure for a similar level of image quality. Local DRLs should be similar or lower to the national DRLs. They could be higher only if the clinical benefits for some medical indications are fully explained and reported. Local DRLs may be used as a quality benchmark to track outliers and can be also used as alert values.