WG2 How to further develop the ALARA culture including E&T

1. WG2How to further develop the ALARA culture including E&T

2. Questions • What is ALARA culture? How is it defined? • What are the roles of the different parties? • International organizations • Regulatory bodies • Constructors/suppliers • Licensees • Workers • Public • Do E&T contribute to ALARA culture? How?

3. Definition of ALARA culture • A reference framework, a state of mind and attitude • Allowing an individual and/or an organization to act in a responsable way in order to manage risks and giving safety the priority it should have; • Characterized by risk awareness, balanced judgement of risk and benefits, and the capability to develop and use required skills and tools for risk assessment and management; • Realized through transdisciplenary education and training tailored at each level; • Supported by management commitment, guidance and supervision of competent authorities on European and national level; • Making use of a clear definition of responsabilities. • It should have a continuous character covering all processes where RP is involved. It should have full support of authorities and professional organizations, while systematically integrated in CQI (continuous quality improvement).

4. Role of international organizations • Give more priority and unceasing attention to ALARA; • Exchange experiences in a systematic way in order to harmonize ALARA; • Create conditions for the improvement of the ALARA culture through information campaigns, networking and support of E&T ; • Stimulate development of a European syllabus for RP; • Foster and support ALARA programs in specific areas such as medicine, NORM, industrial radiography, ... (Current programs focus on keeping know-how rather than on the applications. ALARA culture is a conditio sine qua non to achieve results; support is needed to develop this and work this out in the different application fields of ionizing radiation.)

5. Role of national regulatory bodies • Should stimulate improvement of the ALARA culture of the operating companies, RP qualified experts and officers, professional groups (like radiologists, radiographers, ...) to increase their ability to act in a reasonable way by means of • Conceiving a framework for ALARA implementation within the RP organization; • Guidance, advice and supervision in optimization to improve ALARA culture through E&T; • The creation of opportunities for dialogue, debate and information exchange; • The exchange experiences within and with other countries on incidents and accidents, with structured feedback; • Stimulation of courses, seminars and information for all stakeholders. • Should improve ALARA culture and implementation capacity of the own organization.

6. Role of constructors/suppliers • Should take the lead in improving technologies to create opportunities for the implementation of ALARA at the level of the operators (design equipment in such a way that optimization can be organized on the workfloor); • Improve safety culture in maintanance; • Provide adequate information for and feedback of the end-users.

7. Role of licensees • Stimulate information, E&T, open communication and transparancy; • Improve safety through competence building and the creation of follow-up indicators for safety culture; • Create learning environment for human and organizational liability in order to build safety culture (errare humanum est); • Provide a clear and transparant reporting and acting structure for ALARA.

8. Public, patients and workers • Should have the right to be fully informed, resp. educated and trained on the risks they occur. They should be guaranteed sufficient protection based on justification and well developed optimization. • This could be realized more effectively through involvement. • Keep a questioning attitude. • Be aware of its responsibilities.

9. Experts Education and training centers • Provide adequate theoretical information and practical training (OJT); • Add the concept of ALARA and safety culture throughout the entire program • Broaden the scope of E&T in order to allow understanding complex risks situations within their context and value judgements; • Create complex problem solving capacity by a transdisciplinary approach.

10. Do E&T contribute to ALARA culture? How? … YES… • Awareness (key characteristic of ALARA culture) can only start if one is well informed. • The concept of ALARA should be a seperate topic in RP training. • ALARA examples, experiences,... should be touched upon throughout the entire RP training

11. Recommendations • Definition of ALARA culture • Implementation of ALARA culture should be a new priority for international organizations, systematic support is needed • Regulatory bodies should develop a new interactive approach to stimulate the implementation of ALARA which requires a transdisciplinary framework; exchange of information; set up of an ALARA framework in each country. • Constructors should take the lead in improving technologies to create opportunities for the implementation of ALARA • Workers, public and patients : involvement should be organized based on adequate information on the way ALARA is taken into account • Licensees should stimulate information, E&T, open communication and transparancy; provide a clear and transparant reporting and acting structure

12. Recommendations • E&T E&T in RP : • Always include ALARA culture (as seperate topic in syllabus, with specific case studies mentioned throughout entire program) • Development of harmonized training programs • Development op standard material