EMRADDOSE: Emergency Radiation Dose Assessment App

Response to emergencies is by its very nature characterised by urgency. During a nuclear or radiological emergency (NRE), radiation protection professionals may need to perform quick radiation dose estimations in order to inform medical management of affected individuals.

Methods and step-by-step algorithms for emergency dose estimation have been published and relevant sources are provided below (see references section). It is clear however, that even the implementation of simple algorithms, can be challenging in stressful emergency situations. In stress, the mere task of looking up the proper coefficients for dose calculations increases the probability for error. Access to needed information may also be hampered in case of emergency.

The Emergency Radiation Dose Assessment App (EmRadDose) aims to streamline the steps of typical dose calculations, needed to guide medical management of affected people, in case of NRE. EmRadDose was created as a stand-alone, off-line tool that may be installed on any Android device (most widely available mobile operating system). It includes information and detailed in-app guidance, needed for quick dose calculations. At the same time, the algorithm steps are clearly organised in order to reduce the probability of calculation errors. At the moment the app provides calculators for the following calculations:

  • Effective dose due to external irradiation (point source)
  • Committed effective dose due to inhalation of radionuclides
  • Committed effective dose due to radionuclide contaminated
    wounds

EmRadDose is an open source tool and it is provided free of charge under the “GNU General Public License v3.0“.

EmRadDose can be downloaded from Google Play Store at:

Get it on Google Play

Google Play and the Google Play logo are trademarks of Google LLC.

Scientific Reviewers and Contributors

In alphabertical order:

  • Armin Ansari, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, USA
  • John Damilakis, University of Crete, Greece
  • Mats Isaksson, University of Gothenburg, Sweden
  • Fridtjof Nüsslin, Technical University of Munich, Germany
  • Steve Sugarman, Summit Exercises and Training, USA
  • Hugh Wilkins, Medical Physics and Radiation Protection Consultant, UK

Code Repository

EmRadDose is an open source tool. This means that EmRadDose may be modified and remixed freely by following the license terms. The code may be found at the following repository: https://github.com/tberris/EmRadDose.

EmRadDose: A Tool for Radiation Protection Professionals

It should be noted that EmRadDose is intended to be used by trained radiation protection experts, as it requires a good understanding of NREs. The app includes some of the most important dose calculators and also provides links to other resources and tools used for emergency dose assessments. The scientific sources/references are cited appropriately for easy verification of the methods used. The user is encouraged to explore all relevant references and tools mentioned in the app. provides full step by step guidance and proper explanations in every step. . include steps which can increase the probability of errors during the operational conditions of a nuclear or radiological emergency.

Disclaimer, Terms of Use, Data Usage and Privacy Policy

This mobile application provides a set of tools, used for quick external and internal dose assessment of affected individuals, in emergency situations. This application is offered free of charge and is intended for use by appropriately qualified radiation protection professionals. Results produced by the tools provided in this application should be always used in conjunction with sound professional judgement, taking into account the specific condition of every individual (or patient) involved. External and internal dose calculators are included. All methods used are based on scientific principles and published research that is properly cited in the application. Although information provided in this application has been carefully reviewed and comes from sources that are believed to be reliable, no warranty, expressed or implied, is made regarding accuracy, adequacy, completeness, legality, reliability or usefulness of any information. This disclaimer applies to both isolated and aggregate uses of the information. The information is provided on an “as is” basis. All warranties of any kind, express or implied, including but not limited to the implied fitness for a particular purpose, freedom from contamination by computer viruses and non-infringement of proprietary rights are disclaimed. This dose estimation application has NOT been approved for clinical use by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or any other entity. Data usage and privacy policy: This application does not collect, save or transmit any kind of data or sensitive information to any entity. All information is locally and temporarily stored in the user’s device and is deleted when the user exits the relevant calculator screen or the application. This application does not require any special permissions and has no access to mobile device functionalities that could possibly compromise user privacy.

References

Deep learning for pneumonia detection on chest x-rays

Recent advances in technology have immensely increased available computing power and data storage capacity . At the same time, digitisation of previously analog aspects of business and life, has made vast amounts of data available for analysis. Every digital log entry can somehow be collected and analysed. This is the ideal breeding ground for machine learning!

(more…)

How to replace the screen on a Nexus 4

This video shows and describes the steps required to replace a broken screen of a Google/LG Nexus 4 mobile phone. Some of the information presented is applicable to other phones.

  1. Materials used:
    Screen repair kit (including mini-tools). Cost: around 45 Euros, including shipping costs
  2. Double-sided tape: 3M LE 300 LSE, 5mm x 5m. Cost: around 9 Euros
  3. Tweezers
  4. Paper cutter knife (needed to cut the double-sided tape in small bands/pieces in order to cover as much surface as possible – please see video)

Video music track listing:
The story unfolds, performed by the Jingle Punks
Whiskey, performed by Huma-Huma
Staring at the valley, performed by Silent Partner
Yard sale, performed by Silent Partner

“Auto Awesome” is really awesome!

I have been using an android mobile device for a while now. I have tried to configure all Google services in order to enjoy the integral user experience. One of the things I like is that the pictures I take with my phone camera are automatically backed up on the cloud when I connect to a Wi-Fi network. This setting can be changed. If you do not mind mobile internet charges you can set it up to backup all taken pictures regardless of the network connection type. One could also select not to backup the pictures. (more…)

Solving criminal cases through crowd-sourcing

I started writing this post a few days ago after reading this article. It looked extremely interesting. The main idea is that in the Boston marathon there were thousands of mobile phones taking pictures and videos. The total duration and number of all videos and pictures shot could be stunning. This could be equivalent to thousands of witnesses testifying with absolute accuracy what they saw. The author was wondering whether crowd-sourcing could become a tool to crime solving. She probably meant to write modern crowd-sourcing as some forms of crowd-sourcing have been in use since long time ago as we will see further below. (more…)

How to create web presentations using free software available online

This post is a tutorial on creating web presentations with free software. The software used is CamStudio (http://camstudio.org/) and optionally a web camera software called Yawcam (http://www.yawcam.com/). Yawcam is a camera software which can “stay on top” while you are presenting your slides. It is capable of showing your face or whatever is in front of your web camera during your presentation. So the end result will look somewhat like picture in picture functionality. The tutorial is given in video format below as well as in written instructions format. Feel free to follow whatever suits you best. (more…)