Case Study: Designing and Manufacturing Custom Lead Cabinet for Cardiology Clinic

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Mars Metal Company/MarShield, Burlington, ON

MarShield (Ontario, Canada) was recently approached by a Senior Nuclear Medicine Technologist/Radiation Safety Officer & Stress Lab Manager from Western Canada’s premier cardiology clinics to design and manufacture a custom cabinet with a vertical storage location for flood sources and phantoms. The customer required the cabinet to be built according to custom dimensions to fit the room’s unique layout, including vertical storage for flood sources. This was required because of the flood sources being filled with radioactive solutions.

The cabinet was for a one-of-a-kind clinic in Western Canada offering complete cardiopulmonary investigations under one roof. The clinic uses advanced innovative technology focusing on providing exceptional, evidence-based, patient-centered care. This was the first clinic in this province to offer onsite Exercise Stress Echocardiograms to help diagnose various cardiac diseases.

MarShield Technical Expert Cory Aitken was presented with a simple concept sketch and some requirements from the customer. From the information which Cory had received; he had a detailed CAD drawing completed including his recommendations for a Custom Lead Lined Decay Storage Cabinet. The CAD drawing was presented to the customer then approved and signed off on within days.

Product Specifications

The cabinet was manufactured from A36/44W Carbon Steel encapsulating the internal lead-lined shielding which was 0.50 “thick – 99.94% pure lead (ASTM B-29). Externally the cabinet was 36.5 “tall, 24” deep, and 50” wide as per the customers exact requirements.

The surface of the cabinet was prepared and then painted with a two-part epoxy-based paint in our subtle Grey. The benefit of our paint process is to ensure a durable chip-free surface that is also very smooth and easy to sanitize.

We finished off all of the cabinets with a 300 grade stainless steel top surface with a 6” drop hole and leaded cap. This stainless steel counter option is aesthetically pleasing and also provides an easy clean surface. Internally we added vertical dividers to the left side of the cabinet incorporating about 12” of the space.

All of the MarShield cabinets are manufactured with our heavy duty stainless steel locking safety handles for security.

Outcomes 

MarShield has an ongoing partnership with this customer; and we have supplied these cabinets to three of their clinics in Western Canada. The customer has expressed their confidence and satisfaction with the cabinets that MarShield has provided.

MarShield designs and manufactures a wide range of standard or Custom Designed lead lined cabinets suitable for Nuclear medicine or Radiochemistry laboratories. Our Specialists work directly with the end user such as laboratory technicians to develop a design that is functional and specific to their requirements while meeting all necessary radiation code requirements.