XRF analysis of arsenic‐doped skin phantoms

Abstract Chronic arsenic poisoning can lead to serious health problems including vascular disorders and cancer. Therefore, the development of a system to measure arsenic in vivo would be useful in monitoring exposure. In particular, as skin is one of the tissues in which arsenic has health consequences and is stored for a prolonged period of time, an in vivo measure of skin arsenic content would be a clinically useful measure of chronic exposure. The preliminary development of an x‐ray fluorescence system to measure arsenic in vivo is reported. Standard addition arsenic‐ doped polyester resin phantoms were prepared, and the fluorescence induced by silver K x‐rays from a 109 Cd source was measured. Preliminary estimates of detection limits for an 8 mm thick phantom and an effective dose of ∼0.3 µSv are 3.5 ± 0.2 and 10.3 ± 0.5 ppm in 90 and 180° measurement geometries, respectively, for a measurement time of 30 min. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.