DISCLAIMER: This is a working document provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) 

technical support contractor, SC&A, for use in discussions with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and 

Health (NIOSH) and the Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health (ABRWH), including its Working Groups or 

Subcommittees. Documents produced by SC&A, such as memorandum, white paper, draft or working documents are 

not final NIOSH or ABRWH products or positions, unless specifically marked as such. This document prepared by 

SC&A represents its preliminary evaluation on technical issues.

NOTICE: This document has been reviewed to identify and redact any information that is protected by the 

Privacy Act 5 USC §552a and has been cleared for distribution. 

Memorandum

To: Los Alamos National Laboratory Work Group

From: SC&A, Inc.

Date: June 10, 2019

Subject: SC&A Review of “NIOSH Response to NTS Report NC ID 484 (LANL)” 

On April 4, 2019, SC&A was tasked with reviewing NIOSH Response to NTS Report NC ID 484 

(LANL) (March 2019). That report (NIOSH 2019) responds to an SC&A finding about a 1999 

Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) self-assessment (Bracket and LaBone 1999; reported 

and tracked by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) as NC ID 484) cited in its July 23, 2017, 

memorandum report (SC&A 2017a). The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health 

(NIOSH) subsequently responded to this and other findings related to Special Exposure Cohort 

(SEC) Petition-00109 for LANL in a September 2018 report (NIOSH 2018). SC&A further 

amplified its response to these issues in its most recent (November 16, 2018) report (SC&A 

2018). 

NTS Report NC ID 484 (DOE 1999) resulted from a four-day assessment of the LANL internal 

dose evaluation program conducted March 22–25, 1999, by representatives from Savannah River 

Site (SRS), MJW Corporation, and LANL’s Radiation Protection Services Group (ESH 12) and 

Quality Assurance Group (ESH-14) (Bracket and LaBone 1999). The assessment had 10 

noncompliance findings (DOE 1999), the first three of which were found to impair LANL’s 

ability to monitor individuals “likely to receive a committed effective dose equivalent of 0.1 rem 

(0.001 sievert) or more from all occupational radionuclide intakes in a year” (10 CFR 

835.402(c)(1)). 

These first three findings were as follows (DOE 1999): 

1. Some workers and their supervisors are not accurately completing the “health 

physics checklist” (utilized for enrolling workers into dosimetry programs) to 

the extent that these checklists may not identify those radionuclides actually 

handled by the worker. Thus, some workers are not being assigned to the 

appropriate routine bioassay program in accordance with site requirements. 

[835.402(c)(1)] 

2. Some radiological workers are not complying with specific RWPs that require 

them to participate in a bioassay program. As an example, 2 out of 5 of 

workers [40%] who performed work under a specific RWP did not participate 

in the bioassay program in accordance with requirements of the RWP. 

[835.402(c)(1)] 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 2 June 10, 2019

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3. Johnson Controls of Northern New Mexico (JCNNM), the principle [sic]

subcontractor to Los Alamos National Laboratory, may not be enrolling all 

workers who are potentially exposed to radionuclides into the appropriate 

bioassay program in accordance with site requirements. [835.402(c)(1)] 

Given the significance and scope of findings for all 10 noncompliances identified and reported to 

DOE’s Office of Enforcement, LANL developed and accomplished a series of corrective actions 

that included:

• Establishment of a web-based Dosimetry Participation Verification Program to ensure 

better management of worker bioassay participation

• Development of LANL-wide dosimetry enrollment criteria, facility-specific dosimetry 

matrices, and implementation of a new dosimetry enrollment process 

• New or revised procedures for the following: 

– Health physics checklist procedure 

– Bioassay enrollment procedure 

– Bioassay kit circuit procedure 

– Radiological dose assessment process and examples 

– Special internal dosimetry and bioassay process 

– Terminations 

– Annual report card to workers 

– Radiation Exposure Information and Reporting System 

As noted in its July 27, 2017, review, SC&A found that “the above non-compliances and 

corrective actions are important to the LANL bioassay program, quite apart from 10 CFR 

Part 835 compliance, and evince likely longstanding implementation issues with that program.” 

Previous SC&A Position, Comments, and Recommendation 

SC&A made clear its concerns in subsequent work group and full Board discussions regarding 

this self-assessment, its noncompliances, and its implications for dose reconstruction under the 

Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act (EEOICPA). One concern 

is that the 1999 review involved a very small Radiological Work Permit (RWP) sample size and 

found a relatively large (40%) nonparticipation rate for job-specific bioassays. There is no 

certainty of how extensive this nonparticipation may have been across the laboratory, nor how 

engrained it may have been in past practices. As SC&A has emphasized, this brings into question 

the completeness and accuracy of the bioassay database that is the basis for NIOSH’s coworker 

approach, and SC&A expected that NIOSH, along with LANL, would go beyond the Bracket 

and LaBone (1999) sampling results to confirm the adequacy of the overall job-specific program 

in the 1996–2000 timeframe, as noted below in a statement by SC&A at the August 15, 2017, 

LANL work group meeting. 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 3 June 10, 2019

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So, in [the case of the LANL 1999 self-assessment], I think the team spent three 

days looking at a limited number of RWPs, and checklists, and what have you. 

And that was the basis for these findings. 

But I think, you know, as we’re looking at some considerations, we don’t know 

the scope of this. I understand that NIOSH is exploring this with Los Alamos, 

trying to find out. But we may never know the scope, in the sense that the review 

team probably just did a limited, very limited sample over the few days they had. 

But this raises some questions. And the same questions that we’re raising, I think, 

as Savannah River. If you, you know, have a problem with your bioassay 

participation and your program enrollment, it’s very clear that you have a 

question that rides on the completeness and accuracy of your database. 

And the scale and scope of that incompleteness or inaccuracy is something that 

you're not going to be able to know without doing a fair amount of leg work. 

[ABRWH 2017, pp. 54–55] 

SC&A further emphasized in its November 2018 report the need to ascertain if a broader 

programmatic deficiency in the LANL job-specific bioassay program existed, beyond the limited 

RWP sampling conducted during what was cited as a 3-day1 self-assessment in 1999: 

1 Subsequent review has established that the self-assessment was conducted over 4 days.

It would seem that two central questions remain to be resolved. First, what is the 

adequacy and completeness of the LANL bioassay program in light of the 1999 

findings? Second, can potential doses to unmonitored workers be bounded for 

exposures to exotic radionuclides? 

For the first question, there is a need to follow up on the findings of the 1999 

LANL self-assessment and ascertain whether those findings are indicative of a 

serious programmatic deficiency that would impair the completeness of bioassay 

results and records for workers through 2000 (when corrective actions were put 

into place). If there is evidence that a substantial number of workers were not 

enrolled in bioassay programs as required or that many workers did not provide 

required bioassays, NIOSH would need to consider whether that would render 

bioassay records inadequate and incomplete for purposes of dose reconstruction 

with sufficient accuracy. [SC&A 2018, p. 20] 

SC&A made the following recommendation to the LANL Work Group in its November 16, 

2018, review of NIOSH’s September 2018 white paper:2

2 While SC&A (2018) cites “1995” as starting point for this time period, the post-SEC period in question 

actually begins on January 1, 1996.

SC&A recommends that the Work Group has NIOSH follow up on the 1999 

LANL self-assessment results...and substantiate whether and how these reported 

program deficiencies impact the adequacy and completeness of bioassay results 

 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 4 June 10, 2019

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for 1995–2000... A pertinent question is whether bioassay data are sufficiently 

complete, given evidence of incomplete worker bioassay program enrollments, 

inadequate use of checklists to identify radionuclides being handled, and 

nonparticipation of workers in required bioassays (particularly, transient CTWs). 

This question is particularly relevant given LANL’s apparent reliance on 

engineering controls, PPE, and respiratory protection, backed up by RWP-driven 

surveillance of job contamination levels, to trigger an assessment for the need for 

bioassay. [SC&A 2018, pp. 9–10] 

Finally, SC&A further underscored this point at the full Board meeting at Redondo Beach, CA, 

in December 2018: 

So, in any case -- so we were looking at the implementation part of it and our 

concern, essentially, was LANL performed a self-assessment in 1999, which turns 

out to probably be the most comprehensive look at whether or not the bioassay 

program was being implemented effectively or not. And it came up pretty short. 

And the question that we’re most concerned about is to what extent the rather 

quick sampling that they did in that particular review reflects some serious 

deficiencies in the completeness of the bioassay records that may undercut come 

of the assumptions that we have regarding that program. [ABRWH 2018, p. 88] 

In summary, SC&A’s position has been, and continues to be, that the 1999 self-assessment 

results substantiate significant program deficiencies in the management of the LANL bioassay 

program prior to 2000 and indicate potentially significant incompleteness in it by virtue of the 

limited sampling of job-specific bioassays, checklists, and subcontractor enrollments conducted 

by the assessment team over 4 days. However, that very limited sampling leaves unknown the 

extent of these deficiencies for the overall LANL job-specific bioassay and subcontractor 

bioassay enrollment programs, respectively. SC&A recommended to the work group that NIOSH 

follow up on the 1999 self-assessment to determine “whether and how these reported program 

deficiencies impact the adequacy and completeness of bioassay results for 1995–2000,” 

specifically, January 1, 1996–December 31, 1999 (SC&A 2018, p. 9). 

NIOSH Response

In its November 2018 response to SC&A’s findings, NIOSH agreed that the “presumption of 

compliance” premise for applying a 100 mrem per year dose threshold for unmonitored workers 

at LANL may not be applicable, given the information that was provided in SC&A’s review 

(p. 30): 

NIOSH agrees with many of the issues identified by SC&A in its review of the 

LANL ER Addendum. Specifically, NIOSH agrees that LANL may not have been 

in full compliance with all aspects of 10 CFR 835 during the entire period under 

evaluation (1996-2005). NIOSH further acknowledges the possibility that some 

workers who should have been monitored according to procedure, may not have 

been. 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 5 June 10, 2019

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However, NIOSH disputed that the NC ID 484 findings and other SC&A technical findings 

undercut its evaluation report conclusion that unmonitored workers with exposures to the 

“primary” radionuclides—uranium, plutonium, and tritium—would have been unlikely to have 

received intakes that resulted in 100 mrem committed effective dose equivalent (CEDE), as 

provided in NIOSH’s conclusion to its September 2018 report: 

The field monitoring and contamination control programs at LANL were wellestablished and formalized by January 1, 1996. These programs, which were 

intended to ensure that unmonitored individuals were unlikely to receive intakes 

of 100 mrem CEDE, were in place and being implemented during the period of 

this evaluation. 

Based upon its review of existing bioassay results, NIOSH finds that workers who 

were monitored for the primary radionuclides (uranium, plutonium, and tritium) 

were unlikely to have received intakes exceeding 2% of the SALI (or intakes that 

would have resulted in 100 mrem CEDE). NIOSH also believes that intakes to the 

unmonitored population would have been lower than that of the monitored

population. NIOSH therefore concludes that unmonitored workers were unlikely 

to have received intakes of 2% of the SALI, and the assignment of 2% SALI 

intakes for unmonitored workers with access to controlled areas is bounding. 

NIOSH further finds no reason to believe that intakes of exotic radionuclides by 

unmonitored workers would be substantially different. In summary, NIOSH 

concludes that the weight of the evidence supports assignment of 2% SALI 

intakes for unmonitored workers, as proposed in the ER Addendum, is 

sufficiently bounding and claimant favorable. [NIOSH 2018, pp. 30–31]

In its most recent (NIOSH 2019) report, NIOSH provides a specific discussion of its assessment 

of each deficiency noted in LANL’s noncompliance report. For Deficiency 1 regarding 

inadequate health physics checklists (and by extension, Deficiencies 2 and 3 for gaps in jobspecific bioassay participation and subcontractor bioassay enrollments), NIOSH addresses the 

broader question of dose reconstruction feasibility in the context of the availability and 

completeness of coworker data for the primary radionuclides. In that discussion, NIOSH 

observes that there are “extensive” such data available and lists the number of in vitro and in 

vivo records by radionuclide for 1996–2005. NIOSH concludes that despite “some workers” not 

participating in the appropriate bioassay program, there was “nevertheless sufficient overall 

worker participation in the various routine bioassay programs that statistically-valid co-worker 

models could be generated from the resulting data” (NIOSH 2019, p. 25). Finally, “Although 

NIOSH does not find this deficiency to impact its ability to bound unmonitored intakes to the 

primary radionuclides, it remains a concern with regard to bounding intakes of exotic 

radionuclides” (NIOSH 2019, p. 25).

NIOSH’s conclusion for that report further emphasizes this position (NIOSH 2019, p. 28):

As stated in the preceding section, NIOSH has not identified any dose 

reconstruction infeasibilities for the primary radionuclides at LANL. LANL has 

had effective routine bioassay programs in place for these radionuclides 

throughout the period under evaluation and sufficient bioassay data are available 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 6 June 10, 2019

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to NIOSH. The primary focus of the self-assessment was clearly the routine 

bioassay programs (i.e., Am, Pu, U, and tritium). 

Nevertheless, it is important to remember that the 1999 LANL self-assessment 

(which led to NC ID 484) was an evaluation of the IDEPs existing at LANL at 

that time. Significant flaws were highlighted in NC ID 484, which led to 

significant improvements to LANL’s IDEPs. However, in its review of all of the 

available documentation associated with NC ID 484 and the corrective actions 

that followed, NIOSH did not find any reason to abandon the use of the ORAUTOTIB-0062 co-worker models to bound unmonitored worker intakes for the 

primary radionuclides. 

NIOSH also observed that the “issues and concerns identified in Nonconformance Report NC ID 

484 were associated with the routine bioassay programs being implemented at that time, and 

these routine bioassay programs were for LANL’s primary radionuclides of concern” (NIOSH 

2019, p. 29). 

SC&A Response

SC&A recommended to the work group that NIOSH needed to follow up on the 1999 selfassessment to determine “whether and how these reported program deficiencies impact the 

adequacy and completeness of bioassay results for 1995–2000” (SC&A 2018, p. 9). Based on a 

recent NIOSH-led interview with LANL managers who were present at the 

time, it is now clear that LANL, itself, had not conducted such a retrospective followup review 

(Interview 2019).3

 With a very limited sampling by LANL showing two out of five workers not 

participating in required job-specific bioassays under the reviewed RWP (addressed as 

“Deficiency 2” in NIOSH’s review), it remains unclear whether a corresponding gap likewise 

existed in sitewide, RWP-required, job-specific bioassays over this time period. 

3 This interview was held on May 21, 2019, during the final drafting of this memorandum report, by NIOSH 

with SC&A present. The summary of this interview will be available pending internal agency review. 

This is not a question of the effectiveness of the routine bioassay program for the primary 

radionuclides at LANL, nor is it a concern over the amount of routine bioassay data available for 

these radionuclides. Rather, the NC ID 484 finding regarding lack of LANL worker participation 

in job-specific bioassays raises the question, unanswered in our view, of the adequacy and 

completeness of that program in 1996–2000. If the missing bioassays in this small sample reflect 

a circumstance where almost half of RWP-required bioassays site wide may be missing, this 

could compromise the existing coworker models—given that RWPs often involve unique 

radiological source terms, work activities, and exposure circumstances—leading to missing 

doses that could adversely affect the dose distribution upon which the coworker models are 

based. There needs to be an objective basis for judging whether or not those missing bioassay 

results translate into missing doses that make a difference in that coworker distribution.

NIOSH claims there are “no dose reconstruction infeasibilities for the primary radionuclides at 

LANL” and points to the number of radionuclide-specific in vitro and in vivo records cited in 

Tables 1 and 2 of its report (NIOSH 2019, p. 21). NIOSH concludes that despite bioassay 

program shortcomings, such as inadequate checklists, enrollments, and nonparticipation in RWP 

 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 7 June 10, 2019

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job-specific monitoring, “there was nevertheless sufficient overall worker participation in the 

various routine bioassay programs that statistically-valid co-worker models could be generated 

from the resulting data” (NIOSH 2019, p. 25). 

SC&A disagrees with this conclusion because the uncertain gap in what may be the upper end of 

potential radiation intakes due to missing RWP job-specific bioassays and enrollments draws 

into question the database’s representativeness and completeness.4 There has been no validation 

of the adequacy and completeness of sitewide job-specific bioassay data for 1996–2000 by either 

LANL or NIOSH in terms of a followup on this question. The disclosure of potential bioassay 

incompleteness provided in 1999 by NC ID 484 makes invalid a conclusion regarding the 

“statistical” validity of the LANL coworker model without such a review, as recommended by 

SC&A last year. 

4 RWPs can be required for nonroutine, specialized radiation work involving unique sources or exposure 

circumstances that require preplanning for protective equipment (such as respirators), air sampling, job-specific 

bioassays, and health physics surveillance. The lack of bioassays for a significant portion of workers on such RWPs 

may skew the overall bioassay database unless it can be shown either that job-specific bioassay results at LANL 

during this time period were not sufficiently different than routine bioassay results, or that the proportion of missing 

bioassays in the 1999 RWP sampling is not reflective of overall LANL-wide performance. 

SC&A’s concerns for LANL are analogous to those that it has raised about a similar gap in jobspecific bioassays at SRS that were the subject of a Notice of Violation and civil penalty in 1998. 

Self-assessments conducted by the SRS contractor found nonparticipation rates for job-specific 

bioassays at SRS of 67% (limited survey) and 79% (complete survey) (SC&A 2017b). Given the 

lack of RWP-required, job-specific bioassays submitted, Westinghouse Savannah River 

Company conducted a resurvey of all workers on job-specific bioassays for 1997 and found none 

had positive intakes for the period in question. However, with this resurvey limited to one year 

(1997) and with incomplete RWPs for prior years, NIOSH has since undertaken an expanded 

sampling of newly identified RWPs for those years to validate that corresponding worker jobspecific bioassay results compare favorably with sitewide construction trade worker (CTW) data, 

and can be bounded by existing coworker models. While the RWP and enrollment sampling 

scope was very limited at LANL, the findings of NC ID 484 are no less significant and deserve 

further review.

While NIOSH (2019, p. 28) notes that “the primary focus of the self-assessment was clearly the 

routine bioassay programs (i.e., Am, Pu, U, and tritium),” this does not necessarily appear to be 

the case for NC ID 484, which also reviewed nonroutine RWP-driven job-specific bioassays. 

This LANL self-assessment was conducted in response to a DOE headquarters enforcement 

program 120-day moratorium, entailing contractor actions to self-assess their respective internal 

dose evaluation programs (IDEPs) and report violations. This moratorium came on the heels of 

major notices of violations at SRS and Mound involving nonparticipation of workers in RWPrequired, job-specific bioassays, among other IDEP issues. The outside health physics reviewers 

for the LANL self-assessment team came from Mound and SRS. Findings of bioassay 

nonparticipation and the proportion of workers not submitting job-specific bioassays were 

comparable to those made at those two sites. While the radionuclides involved may have been 

the primary ones, as observed by NIOSH, the LANL self-assessment clearly focused on the 

implementation of the nonroutine job-specific bioassay program. 

 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 8 June 10, 2019

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In its 2019 white paper, NIOSH emphasizes four points (derived from its earlier 2018 report) that 

justify its ability to dose reconstruct internal dose at LANL after 1995 with sufficient accuracy 

(NIOSH 2019). These are listed below with a corresponding SC&A response.

1. NIOSH 2019, p. 28: “LANL is under a legal requirement to monitor workers likely to 

receive intakes of 100 mrem CEDE.”

SC&A Response: Yes, but as NC ID 484 illustrates, and as SC&A pointed out in its 

earlier reviews, the actual implementation of field programs to satisfy this legal 

requirement often took time following the 1995 enactment of 10 CFR Part 835, and 

compliant monitoring was not necessarily in practice in the years immediately following 

enactment.

2. NIOSH 2019, p. 28: “NIOSH has accumulated a large quantity of bioassay records for 

the period under evaluation that clearly indicate that monitored workers were unlikely to 

receive intakes greater than 100 mrem CEDE (ORAUT-OTIB-0062 and ORAUT-OTIB0063).”

SC&A Response: Yes, but those records may not be complete, and the coworker models 

are potentially invalid in light of NC ID 484’s finding of incomplete RWP-required, jobspecific bioassays. The question that remains is whether the self-assessment’s very 

limited sampling reflects the broader circumstance of LANL’s overall job-specific 

bioassay completeness for 1996–2000.

3. NIOSH 2019, p. 28: “LANL has robust field-monitoring programs designed and 

implemented to ensure that unmonitored individuals are unlikely to receive intakes of 

100 mrem CEDE.”

SC&A Response: SC&A agrees that LANL had sound monitoring programs, except for 

the 10 implementation deficiencies cited in NC ID 484, including three that directly 

impaired “field-monitoring program designed and implemented to ensure that 

unmonitored individuals are unlikely to receive intakes of 100 mrem CEDE.” It can be 

argued that these field-monitoring programs did not become sufficiently “robust,” from 

an implementation standpoint, until corrective actions were taken by the end of 1999. 

Further, even that program characterization may be questionable, given evidence of 

persistent and systemic deficiencies in the overall LANL nuclear safety and radiological 

control programs being implemented in the 2000s, as described in a succession of DOE 

enforcement actions (e.g., NNSA 2003, DOE 2003, and NNSA 2007).

4. NIOSH 2019, p. 28: “Because it is evident from the available bioassay data that 

monitored workers were unlikely to receive intakes greater than 100 mrem CEDE, 

NIOSH concluded...that unmonitored workers were also unlikely to receive intakes 

greater than 100 mrem CEDE.”

SC&A Response: This is only true if the available bioassay data are sufficiently complete 

to support a bounding coworker model. As noted above, there is the possibility that 

substantial job-specific bioassay data are lacking, with uncertain implications for the 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 9 June 10, 2019

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validity of the coworker model. If unmonitored job-specific bioassay data can be 

demonstrated as comparable and bounded by routine bioassay data for monitored 

workers, or by bioassay data for monitored coworkers on the same RWPs (e.g., for a 

representative sample of LANL radiological work activities), then this claim would have 

merit. 

In terms of the followup that SC&A recommended to the work group in 2018 (SC&A 2018, 

pp. 9–10), one option was to make an inquiry to LANL regarding any further or expanded 

reviews the laboratory may have conducted following NC ID 484 to identify, enumerate, and 

resurvey workers who did not submit required bioassays. Was the very limited RWP sample of 

two out of five nonparticipants reflective of sitewide implementation? If LANL performed no 

followup, how did the laboratory address these potential gaps in its internal dose evaluations for 

affected workers prior to corrective actions? How is it “likely” that unmonitored workers 

performing radiological work under various RWPs in 1996–2000 did not exceed 100 mrem 

CEDE if there are no dose data for them and the coworker model may be based on a dose 

distribution that may exclude as much as 40% or more of RWP job-specific exposures? How can 

NIOSH conclude that the dose distribution for all monitored workers would be bounding for 

unmonitored workers if an appreciable, but still unconfirmed, proportion of those workers lack 

required job-specific bioassay results?

From document review and the recent interview conducted with LANL senior radiological 

control managers (May 21, 2019; Interview 2019), NIOSH and SC&A have both confirmed that 

no apparent followup or assessment by LANL along these lines of inquiry had occurred 

following the issuance of NC ID 484. Therefore, the answers to these questions remain unknown 

or problematic.

SC&A also questions NIOSH’s response to “Deficiency 3” regarding deficient bioassay 

enrollments by the primary subcontractor, Johnson Controls. Apart from acknowledging the 

LANL corrective actions, NIOSH cites statements by subcontractor management that its workers 

were unlikely to receive any dose from radionuclide intakes and that if subcontractor workers 

were in violation of required 10 CFR Part 835 monitoring enrollment requirements, it was a 

response to their “being placed on bioassay programs when there is little or no potential for 

intakes” (NIOSH 2019, p. 26). While NIOSH is careful to state it does not accept these 

management statements because they had not corroborated them, they are cited as illustrative of 

the manager’s thinking at the time of the 1999 self-assessment.

SC&A finds NIOSH’s use of management’s thinking in this regard somewhat contradictory of 

its previous conclusions. If LANL’s monitoring program was “well-established and formalized” 

by 1996, as concluded by NIOSH (2018, p. 18), the apparent liberties taken by this manager 

would not have occurred in the first place or would have been corrected by management. From 

this account, it is clear that as late as 1999, past practice and personal professional judgment may 

have driven the bioassay program (at least for enrollments), not necessarily 10 CFR Part 835 

requirements as reflected in LANL procedures. How many subcontractor workers were 

inappropriately excluded from bioassay monitoring for the work they were assigned? Over what 

length of time? Has LANL, or anyone, investigated the accuracy of this manager’s claim that it 

would have been unlikely for any Johnson Controls workers under their supervision to have 

received an intake during the late 1990s? A cursory review of NIOSH/OCAS Claims Tracking 
SC&A, Inc.

SC& Review of NIOSH Response, NC ID 484, page 10 June 10, 2019

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System (NOCTS) claim information for crafts and trade workers at LANL in 1996–2000 (e.g., 

electricians, pipefitters, custodians, plumbers, and welders), who would typify Johnson Controls 

workers in that time period,5 shows a number of confirmed intakes of primary radionuclides such 

as plutonium and uranium. 

5 NOCTS does not distinguish between LANL employees and Johnson Controls employees.

For “Deficiency 1,” regarding workers and their supervisors inaccurately completing “health 

physics checklists” used to identify radionuclides of concern for bioassay enrollment, NIOSH 

concludes that this would bear only on the primary radionuclides and that there are sufficient 

routine bioassay data to support coworker model development. SC&A’s concern over this issue 

and response is the same as noted for Deficiency 2. 

The other seven deficiencies do not bear on 10 CFR 835.402(c)(1) as it pertains to LANL’s 

ability to monitor individuals “likely to receive a committed effective dose equivalent of 0.1 rem 

(0.001 sievert) or more from all occupational radionuclide intakes in a year,” and SC&A has no 

issue with NIOSH’s response. 

Conclusion

SC&A agrees that the issues surrounding NC ID 484 pertain mostly to the primary radionuclides 

and relate to the statistical validity of the database underpinning the current coworker model for 

them. However, SC&A disagrees with NIOSH’s assessment that the amount of routine bioassay 

data available obviates the need to confirm its completeness in the face of NC ID 484 findings of 

potential data gaps for bioassay enrollments and RWP job-specific bioassay participation. SC&A 

stands by its original recommendation to the work group that NIOSH follow up with LANL to 

ascertain whether the bioassay incompleteness identified in this limited sampling in 1999 reflects 

a broader incompleteness in LANL’s bioassay database for 1996–2000. Such an indication 

would bring into question the statistical validity of the current coworker model for assigning 

unmonitored doses for LANL workers. The central concern stemming from NC ID 484 was not 

only related to the need for an improved and compliant LANL bioassay program going forward, 

but also to all of the LANL workers who were inappropriately not bioassayed prior to the selfassessment team confirming these deficiencies in 1999. Has anyone looked at the significance of 

these potential monitoring gaps for the workers involved and their impact on LANL’s internal 

dose records upon which NIOSH’s dose reconstruction relies? The recent interview with LANL 

settles the first question, regarding whether any retrospective followup had occurred (it had not), 

but does not settle the second, as to the implications for adequate dose reconstruction after 1995. 

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