Assessment of Magnetic Field Exposures for a Mortality Study at a Uranium Enrichment Plant

Details

• Personal Author:
  Wenzl TB
• Description:
  A survey of workplace exposures to 60-Hz magnetic fields was carried out at a large uranium enrichment facility to assign exposures for an updated mortality study. Stratified random selection was used to choose workers for measurement in all jobs and areas, to determine whether consistent distinctions could be made between job groups based on average magnetic field exposures. A total of 252 workdays was measured with a personal monitor, and individual average magnetic field exposures ranged from 0.20 to 82.6 mG. A priori job groups showed significant differences between geometric mean exposures, which ranged from 0.80 to 3.51 mG. Most of these groups showed widely ranging exposures, so they were subdivided based on location and job title to improve the precision of the exposure assignments for the mortality study. These final assignments were made up of 26 groups having arithmetic means ranging from 0.43 to 24.9 mG, with most groups defined by location in addition to job title. In general, electrical maintenance workers did not have elevated magnetic field exposures (> 3 mG), but the exposures of the electricians in switchyard (substation) jobs were elevated. Available employment records did not allow most electricians to be distinguished based on location, so they were assigned exposures based on their plantwide average (above 7 mG). An estimated 9% of the work time of this cohort was spent at daily average exposures above 3 mG, despite the very large electric power consumption at this plant. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Environmental Monitoring Epidemiology Magnetic Fields Mortality Occupational Exposure Occupational Health Safety Uranium Workplace
• Keywords:
  Author Keywords: Bimodality Exposure-assessment Exposure Assessment For Epidemiology Magnetic-fields Magnetic-properties Magnetic Field Exposures Mortality-data Mortality-rates Occupational-exposure Uranium-compounds Uranium-miners Uranium-mining Uranium Workers Work-environment Worker-health Workplace-monitoring

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• ISSN:
  0002-8894
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  Ohio ; OSHA Region 5
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  DSHEFS - Division of Surveillance, Hazard Evaluations, and Field Studies
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Volume:
  60
• Issue:
  6
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20025622
• Citation:
  Am Ind Hyg Assoc J 1999 Nov/Dec; 60(6):818-824
• Contact Point Address:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Mail Stop R-44, 4676 Columbia Parkway, Cincinnati, OH 45226
• CAS Registry Number:
  Uranium (CAS RN 7440-61-1)
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2000
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Source Full Name:
  American Industrial Hygiene Association Journal
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:56014bf12cfe21a6a2bb9a2abf9d9b9992b5b68d652aafc8d2e2966b0c60c0071f62f77db59ec5213d0866bca7bde172771c7ad2d6d8ddd57545da0bc3d2c85a
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/196906/cdc_196906_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 327.16 KB ]