Occupational doses from radon in Spanish spas.

Recent international recommendations have included exposure to natural radiation as one of the sources to monitor in certain occupationally exposed groups. Among those mentioned are workers in thermal spas, who may be exposed to high radiation doses due to the high concentration of radon in the indoor air of the spa. This paper presents the methodology and the results of an evaluation of radiation doses to the staff in different thermal spas in Spain. Different series of samples were collected and measurements made for the radon concentrations in water in 54 spas and in air in 20 spas. In six of the latter group, the air radon concentration was studied in different working areas occupied by the employees. The radon concentrations in water were between <2 and 775 x 10(3) Bq m(-3). The radon concentrations in air were between <10 and 5,200 Bq m(-3). The latter were used to estimate the dose received by each occupational group in the spa by taking into account the radon concentration in their main working area. By means of an exposure-dose conversion factor of 1.43 Sv per J h m(-3), the estimated effective doses were found to lie between 1 and 44 mSv y(-1). This upper limit is higher than the recommended annual limit of 20 mSv y(-1) for an occupational dose.