The relationships between urinary elimination, airborne concentration, and radioactive hand contamination for workers exposed to uranium.

The purposes of this study were to estimate the proportional contribution of uranium dust exposure to urinary excretion of the metal, and to examine the influence of hand contamination on the elimination of uranium from the urine of workers who performed different jobs. The study was based on records taken from a gaseous diffusion plant in 1956. Regression techniques were used to investigate the relationship between uranium concentration in urine and exposure variables, including the concentration of uranium dust and the incidence of hand contamination. The proportional contribution of airborne to urinary uranium was estimated by the slope of this relationship. It is concluded that the workers eliminated uranium at relatively constant rates per unit air concentration (0.67 to 1.27 micrograms/L per micrograms/m3). In addition to airborne uranium, hand contamination significantly contributed to the elimination among maintenance crew, but not among production workers. Furthermore, the production index was shown to be a useful surrogate for airborne and urinary uranium.