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U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL

NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR OCCUPATIONAL

SAFETY AND HEALTH 

+ + + + +

ADVISORY BOARD ON RADIATION AND

WORKER HEALTH 

+ + + + +

SUBCOMMITTEE ON DOSE RECONSTRUCTION REVIEWS

+ + + + +

WEDNESDAY

APRIL 2, 2014

+ + + + +

The Subcommittee convened 

telephonically at 10:30 a.m. Eastern Daylight 

Time, David Kotelchuck, Chairman, presiding.

PRESENT:

DAVID KOTELCHUCK, Chairman

BRADLEY P. CLAWSON, Member

WANDA I. MUNN, Member

DAVID B. RICHARDSON, Member

MARK GRIFFON, Member
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ALSO PRESENT:

TED KATZ, Designated Federal Official

BOB BARTON, SC&A

HANS BEHLING, SC&A

KATHY BEHLING, SC&A

RON BUCHANAN, SC&A

ZAIDA BURGOS, NIOSH

GRADY CALHOUN, DCAS

DOUG FARVER, SC&A

ROSE GOGLIOTTI, SC&A

DeKEELY HARTSFIELD, HHS

JOHN MAURO, SC&A

MUTTY SHARFI, ORAU Team

SCOTT SIEBERT, ORAU Team

MATT SMITH, ORAU Team

JOHN STIVER, SC&A
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C-O-N-T-E-N-T-S

Discussion: Order of Case Consideration 5

Decisions on Case 268 10

Decisions on Case 269 37

Observation Discussions 38

Decisions on Case 294 40

Decisions on Case 324 45

Observation Discussions 85

Discussion on Selecting Blind Reviews 94

Decisions on Case 266 102

Decisions on Case 292 136

Observation Discussions 141

Decisions on Case 293 143

Decisions on Case 237 145

Observation Discussions 177

Decisions on Case 258 195

Observation Discussions 217

Decisions on Case 306 224

Observation Discussion (Case 307) 236

Decisions on Case 243 236

Observation Discussions 240

Discussion: Schedule for Next Meeting 243
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Discussion: Order of Cases Sets 14-18 253 
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1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

2 10:30 a.m.

3 (Roll call.)

4 MR. KATZ: Okay, Dave, so it’s your 

5 agenda. Just let me remind everyone on the 

6 line to please mute your phones except for when 

7 you’re speaking, *6 if you don’t have a mute 

8 button, either way. And same thing, *6 again 

9 to come off of mute.

10 And, Dave, it’s your agenda.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright. 

12 We were finishing the last several of the Oak 

13 Ridge cases. And I don’t know which one folks 

14 want to start with.

15 We have 247.1 and .2 on our agenda. 

16 And then what was the tough one, one that folks 

17 said to avoid until we were ready for a long 

18 discussion?

19 MR. SIEBERT: That would be 268.1

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Do folks 

21 want to start with 268.1?

22 MEMBER MUNN: Have we wrapped up 
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1 237 yet?

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No, we 

3 haven’t wrapped it up -- well, then you want to 

4 go in order. Okay, the lowest one is 247.1 and 

5 .2

6 MEMBER MUNN: Well, not 

7 necessarily in order, it just wanted to pick up 

8 where we left off, and I thought that’s where 

9 we did. We’d started talking about 247, had we 

10 not?

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: We started, 

12 yes. And it was left open. Then we have open 

13 248.1, 249.1. Let’s go to 247, see where we’re 

14 at. We’ll refresh ourselves. And then that 

15 may be open for coming back to at a later time.

16 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I don’t 

18 remember which one that Grady was going to check 

19 out. And I don’t want to rush him on that.

20 Could we put 247.1 up on the screen?

21 MS. GOGLIOTTI: Yeah. Can someone 

22 give me the rights to the screen? I don’t know 
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1 how that works.

2 MR. KATZ: Yeah, John can -- John 

3 should have sent you a link to Live Meeting. Do 

4 you have that, Rose?

5 MS. GOGLIOTTI: I’m on the Live 

6 Meeting, yes.

7 MR. KATZ: Okay. But if you 

8 joined, there are different links by which you 

9 can join. You need to join by the presenter 

10 one. And if you joined by that, then you --

11 MS. GOGLIOTTI: Oh.

12 MR. KATZ: But by active sharing, 

13 you take over the screen.

14 MS. GOGLIOTTI: Okay, I’m going to 

15 have to rejoin then.

16 MR. KATZ: The first link in the 

17 long -- there are multiple links. But the 

18 first link, I think, it will indicate it’s the 

19 presenter’s link. Or whoever, John haven’t 

20 you put up something already or not?

21 MS. GOGLIOTTI: The first link I 

22 joined through. It says present in the title.
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1 MR. KATZ: Right.

2 MEMBER MUNN: Well, I think Beth 

3 was good enough to send us the current version 

4 last night. So I now have it.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, okay. 

6 Well, I can go back to Outlook and --

7 MR. KATZ: Well, John Stiver, are 

8 you not on the line?

9 MR. STIVER: I’m on the line. I’m 

10 opening that up right now.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, fine, 

12 fine, good.

13 MR. STIVER: I’ll transfer it to Rose 

14 once it’s up and going here. Okay.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright, 

16 looks like something -- there we are. There we 

17 are. 229 and we’re going to go to 247.1 and .2.

18 MR. STIVER: Okay, here we are.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

20 Let’s see. Oh, right, okay, this was the one 

21 with the incorrect prorating of the person’s 

22 time.
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1 MR. CALHOUN: That’s the one that 

2 we’re going to go back and look at right away.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That’s 

4 right, okay.

5 MR. CALHOUN: That’s not going to 

6 happen for like a few days at least.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. So 

8 let’s go ahead to 248.1. Since .2 was the same 

9 issue. Okay. Also, okay, this is the B data. 

10 There’s nothing to discuss at this point.

11 You folks at NIOSH were going to 

12 take a look at this and come back to us at a later 

13 time with your recommendations. So kind of a 

14 move forward.

15 MR. CALHOUN: Yeah, this is Grady. 

16 I had told you that I hoped to get that to you 

17 today and that’s not going to happen.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

19 Well, fine. Let’s then do 249.1.

20 MR. KATZ: This is the same.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: This is the 

22 same, okay. Sorry. Then we are at 268.1. 
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1 And this is the one that folks alerted us was 

2 going to be a complicated one.

3 So, Doug, do you want to start 

4 268.1? Or whoever would wish to start.

5 MR. FARVER: I’ll go ahead and 

6 start. This is Doug and then I’ll -- I want to 

7 turn it over to Scott real quick.

8 MEMBER MUNN: So we’re skipping 

9 over 250, right?

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 

11 That was, I thought, resolved.

12 MR. KATZ: That was resolved and 

13 closed.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

15 MR. KATZ: Yeah.

16 MEMBER MUNN: Okay.

17 MR. FARVER: The finding has to do 

18 with an incorrect procedure for reporting the 

19 scaling factor from the Y-12 doses. The 

20 scaling factor was used with the coworker doses 

21 to obtain the claimant doses.

22 And it is a messy, messy 
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1 calculation. And extremely complex. And 

2 with that being said, I’m going to turn it over 

3 to Scott because he probably can explain it 

4 better.

5 MR. SIEBERT: Yeah, this is Scott. 

6 I would call you a coward, except now I’m going 

7 to turn it over to Matt Smith who can now explain 

8 it better.

9 MR. SMITH: Alright. This is Matt 

10 with the ORAU Team.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: By the way, 

12 folks, my line is -- I’m not getting quite the 

13 volume I’d like. Could you speak just a little 

14 louder?

15 MR. SMITH: Sure. How’s that?

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, much 

17 better.

18 MR. SMITH: Okay.

19 MEMBER MUNN: Thanks, Matt.

20 MR. SMITH: You bet. This is a 

21 claim where, in the early days of the project, 

22 we had a unique method for doing coworker dose 
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1 that was developed by the statisticians at 

2 ORAU. It involved taking a look at a worker’s 

3 dose at Y-12 in the post-1960 to roughly 1965 

4 time frame. And then by judging that dose and 

5 it’s magnitude, being able to actually scale 

6 the coworker dose that was needed for the 

7 earlier time period, before 1960, in a 

8 statistical manner.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Was this an 

10 extrapolation?

11 MR. SMITH: That would be the best 

12 simplified way to explain.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

14 MR. SMITH: The statistical method 

15 required at least five quarters of data after 

16 1960. And it also required that you kind of 

17 take a look at the workers’ job functions and 

18 make sure that what they were doing after 1960 

19 was roughly the same as what they were going 

20 before that.

21 What’s happened over time is that we 

22 developed another OTIB called OTIB-20. And I 
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1 think everybody on the call is probably pretty 

2 familiar with that document by now.

3 And what that did was set the stage 

4 for a little bit more simplified way of taking 

5 a look at external coworker dose. At this 

6 time, and actually for several years now, a Y-12 

7 coworker dose was switched over from this older 

8 method to this method that’s the same as all the 

9 other sites based on OTIB-20.

10 So, keeping that in mind, things 

11 like Procedure-42, which described how this 

12 previous method was to be implemented, that 

13 procedure is not even active anymore. The 

14 workbook also is not even active anymore.

15 But with respect to the claim at

16 hand, after taking a look at it, we agree that 

17 the statistical factors that were calculated in 

18 the claim are not correct. This was a worker

19 who terminated their employment, I believe it 

20 was after the first quarter of 1962.

21 So he had exactly five quarters of 

22 data. So he had the minimum required. But 
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1 then he terminated. And what happened with the 

2 tool is [that] the tool applied values of zero 

3 for all the remaining quarters, all the way up 

4 to 1965.

5 And what that did is it artificially 

6 lowered the magnitude of his comparison 

7 coworker dose.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right, of 

9 course.

10 MR. SMITH: What should have been 

11 done, and it is called out in the legacy 

12 Procedure-42, is the calculation should have 

13 been truncated to look at only those first five 

14 quarters. Not the 20 possible quarters that 

15 there were.

16 So we agree that the -- what we call 

17 the scaling factor, which is not -- which again 

18 there’s like a little bit of confusion on the 

19 naming conventions with things. But in any 

20 event, what we would call -- I’ll call it an 

21 adjustment to get through the conversation 

22 cleaner. We agree that the adjustment factor 
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1 was not as high as it needed to be, and the 

2 factor should have been 3.77.

3 There is a PER with respect to the 

4 implementation to the new Y-12 coworker dose. 

5 I took a quick look at it. 

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Could we 

7 scroll down -- pardon me a second. Could we 

8 scroll down just a little on the screen now, on 

9 the PER? Thank you.

10 MR. SMITH: I did take a look at the 

11 data in the current coworker OTIB, I believe, 

12 in preparation for a meeting, whenever it was, 

13 two times ago. And when you’re judging it by 

the 95th 14 percentile, and also considering the 

15 construction trade worker correction factor of 

16 1.4 [which] is going to get folded in, the PER 

17 process will likely give this claimant a higher 

18 dose.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

20 MR. SMITH: The bottom line is, on 

21 this particular claim, it is also another one 

22 like the ones we talked about yesterday, slated 
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1 for a PER evaluation.

2 And the method that was used at the 

3 time is now what we would call an “inactive” and 

4 is not used anymore.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

6 MEMBER MUNN: Matt, have you done a 

7 rough calculation to see how that scaling 

8 factor is going to affect the PoC in this 

9 particular claim?

10 MR. SMITH: I don’t know that I ran 

11 it all the way through PoC values. But I did, 

12 I think, a rough judgment of just eyeballing the 

13 dose. In other words, the magnitude of the 

14 dose that would have been applied for coworker.

15 MEMBER MUNN: Right. And in your 

16 assessment, is this going to create a major 

17 change with respect to the claimant?

18 MR. SMITH: Probably not a major 

19 change. Oh, with respect to what the decision 

20 was?

21 MEMBER MUNN: What the PoC is 

22 likely to be.
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1 MR. SMITH: I would not want to 

2 speak to that without running the PoC in 

3 collaboration with Scott and his team.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sure. And 

5 under any circumstance, that would be an 

6 interim because we’re awaiting PER. Right?

7 MR. SMITH: That is correct. The 

8 other thing I don’t know with respect to this 

9 claim is if it’s already been reworked due to 

10 another cancer being reported.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

12 MR. SMITH: I’m not sure of the 

13 exact claim status right now.

14 MR. CALHOUN: I can check. I 

15 should be able to check that pretty quick. If 

16 the document that is driving the PER is already 

17 complete, then we can move ahead.

18 We’ll do a quick evaluation and see 

19 if it will affect it and we can move ahead. But 

20 if the document’s not complete, we have to wait 

21 until that’s complete before we can do the PER.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. But 
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1 is there agreement by SC&A and NIOSH that this 

2 -- is this issue is resolved? And that this 

3 error can be corrected? Or not?

4 MR. FARVER: Well, I have a couple 

5 of questions. When did this stop being used, 

6 this process?

7 MR. SMITH: Upon publication of 

8 OTIB-64. And I’ll have to take a minute or two 

9 to pull that one up to get a publication date 

10 for you.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

12 MR. FARVER: Because I have a 

13 feeling we’re going to run into this again.

14 MR. SIEBERT: OTIB-64 was in April 

15 of 2013.

16 MR. FARVER: Okay.

17 MR. SMITH: Well, that might have 

18 been the latest publication on it. Let me --

19 that was a Rev[ision] 2. Let me just go to the 

20 publication record. I’m almost there.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

22 MR. SMITH: And initially 
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1 published as Rev 0 in 2009.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

3 MR. FARVER: Does the 2009 Rev take 

4 care of it? Rev 0?

5 MR. SMITH: Yeah. Upon 

6 publication of OTIB-64, we then deactivated 

7 OTIB-13 and Procedure-42 and the tool that’s 

8 the one we’ve been looking at with respect to 

9 this claim.

10 MR. CALHOUN: Just for a little 

11 background information, too, I just looked this 

12 case up and it’s a little bit less than 39 

13 percent right now. So it would take a pretty 

14 significant swing in dose to make that 

15 compensable.

16 MR. FARVER: My point is there’s 

17 been a lot of Y-12 cases completed over the 

18 years. And we’re in another position here 

19 where we’ve got to wait for a PER that may happen 

20 at some point.

21 MR. CALHOUN: Well, it will happen 

22 at some time -- like I said, even this process 
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1 that we’re doing right now causes PERs. We try 

2 to get through them. We’ve got them. We’ve 

3 got a system, we’ve got them logged, we’ve got 

4 them scheduled. It’s just a matter of getting 

5 them done.

6 So in this case we will take another 

7 look at it to see if it is likely to go over. 

8 If it’s not likely to go over, there’s no sense 

9 in rushing it.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 

11 Although we actually, in this, for Oak Ridge, 

12 we do have several now that are waiting on the 

13 PER.

14 MR. CALHOUN: Like I said 

15 yesterday, we have thousands. We’re probably 

16 --

17 (Simultaneous speaking.)

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, yeah. 

19 Okay, true. 

20 MR. KATZ: Back to your question 

21 though, Dave, it sounds like they’re in 

22 agreement that -- I mean, because the NIOSH 
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1 folks just said they made this error and it 

2 needs to be corrected. So I think it’s 

3 resolved that it’s closable.

4 MR. FARVER: I mean, have we 

5 reviewed that procedure and OTIB? SC&A?

6 MEMBER MUNN: Which procedure?

7 MR. FARVER: 42, and what was the 

8 OTIB?

9 MR. SMITH: OTIB-13. I believe 

10 they came up a long time ago.

11 MR. FARVER: Have we reviewed them 

12 since this change?

13 MR. KATZ: The OTIB-42 is --

14 Procedure-42 is obsolete now, is what they’ve 

15 just told us.

16 MR. FARVER: Okay. Then what was 

17 the procedure that took over this process?

18 MR. SMITH: OTIB-64 would have 

19 superseded both OTIB-13 and Procedure-42. And 

20 that would have, again, the publication date 

21 for OTIB-64 is August of 2009.

22 MR. FARVER: Right. Have we 
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1 reviewed that?

2 MR. SMITH: That I don’t know.

3 MEMBER MUNN: We worked PROC-42 

4 over in Procedures, as I recall.

5 MR. KATZ: Wanda, it’s 64. 

6 OTIB-64.

7 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah, but it was 

8 PROC-42 originally, wasn’t it?

9 MR. KATZ: Well, the question now 

10 is, has Procedures reviewed OTIB-64? That’s 

11 the question on the table right now [that] 

12 Doug’s asking.

13 And I expect it has been reviewed, 

14 at least one version of it. But that’s 

15 something we can look up. It really doesn’t 

16 have a bearing on closing this case.

17 MR. FARVER: Well, yes it does, 

18 because then we don’t know if it’s been 

19 corrected or not until we actually review 

20 what’s been written in its place.

21 MR. KATZ: Well, the issue, again, 

22 let’s just go back on this about correcting 
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1 cases. I mean, the issue is not correcting 

2 cases. It’s resolving whether a finding is 

3 correct. And if the finding is correct, then 

4 it can be -- or is agreed upon, it can be closed. 

5 And that’s what we do.

6 The correction of cases is 

7 something that goes on independently of the 

8 Subcommittee.

9 MR. FARVER: So if they wrote 

10 something that does not correct the problem, 

11 it’s okay that they keep making the same 

12 problem?

13 MR. KATZ: Well, I mean, we just had 

14 a discussion about where the problem was, in the 

15 former procedure that’s been made obsolete.

16 MR. SMITH: Let me interject real 

17 quick. In a sense, no correction to 

18 Procedure-42 was made. The entire method 

19 that’s outlined in both Procedure-42 and its 

20 companion OTIB, which is 13, that entire 

21 statistical method of looking at coworker dose 

22 and being able to scale it upward based on an 
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1 individual’s recorded dose, that whole method 

2 was abandoned.

3 You don’t use that method for Y-12 

4 or any other site anymore.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

6 MR. SMITH: We abandoned that and 

7 what we did is we put Y-12 in line with the 

8 methodology that was then in use for all the 

9 other sites, which is based on OTIB-20. And 

10 the procedure itself does call out the proper 

11 way to deal with a claim where somebody has 

12 terminated their employment before the end of 

13 1965.

14 As I read through the SC&A auditor’s 

15 report, they did find that the other claims that 

16 had been looked at were in okay shape. In 

17 looking at the tool itself, I did not find any 

18 automated logic that was put in there to take 

19 a look at available dates for dosimetry.

20 So that’s probably the root problem 

21 here, is there wasn’t an automated function in 

22 the tool to take a look at just how many quarters 
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1 of data were actually available.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: But do I 

3 understand that although the procedure was 

4 abandoned, or really superseded, that those 

5 that were already done, that were looked back 

6 at to make sure that the new procedure was used?

7 MR. SMITH: Yes, that’s the intent 

8 of the PER. Upon completing OTIB-64, we 

recognized that, especially at 95th 9 percentile 

10 values, that the dose could be greater than what 

11 would typically be found by applying the older 

12 method that was in place.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

14 MR. SMITH: So a PER was 

15 recommended. In other words, all claims that 

16 made use of TIB-13 and PROC-42 would be 

17 evaluated down the road.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Fine.

19 MEMBER MUNN: And that’s going to 

20 be an enormous undertaking, David.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It will be, I 

22 gather.
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1 MR. FARVER: Well, in my opinion, 

2 SC&A should be reviewing the process that 

3 supersedes the one that has been discontinued.

4 MR. KATZ: Okay, thanks, Doug. 

5 That’s duly noted.

6 MR. STIVER: This is John Stiver. 

7 I asked Steve Marschke if we looked at doing a 

8 search through the first three sets of 

9 procedures. I’m not finding OTIB-64 in there.

10 I know it’s not in the Set 4 or 5. But I’m 

11 checking with Steve just to make sure.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

13 MS. K. BEHLING: And this is Kathy 

14 Behling, I’m on the BRS system and I don’t see 

15 OTIB-64 on BRS as being reviewed. We did 

16 review OTIB-20.

17 MEMBER MUNN: I lost you at the end, 

18 Kathy.

19 MS. K. BEHLING: We did not review 

20 OTIB-64, according to what I’m looking at on the 

21 BRS, but we did review OTIB-20.

22 MEMBER MUNN: Okay, that would be 
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1 my source for information, so I’m glad you have 

2 it up, thanks.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, people 

4 are checking.

5 MR. SMITH: My rough guess is that 

6 OTIB-64 probably has not been reviewed, because 

7 I would have recalled probably going on and 

8 dealing with comments on it.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

10 MR. SMITH: On a positive front on 

11 that, again, OTIB-64 followed the methodology 

12 that has been reviewed by everyone with respect 

13 to all the other sites. Again, any of the other 

14 external coworker TIBs, and probably a half a 

15 dozen or more of those have been under review. 

16 And that same methodology was used on Y-12.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

18 MR. KATZ: Okay, thanks, Matt. 

19 That is actually making some sense. Because 

20 this is -- I guess what I’m hearing you say is 

21 it’s specific to the site. And we haven’t had 

22 that site Work Group operating in a long time.
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1 MR. SMITH: That’s probably right.

2 MR. KATZ: That makes a lot of 

3 sense, Matt. And we can put this on our list 

4 of -- because SC&A’s collecting anyway right 

5 now a list of procedures and Site Profiles that 

6 haven’t been reviewed or due for new reviews and 

7 so on. So this can just land right flatly on 

8 that list.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: In terms of 

10 this Committee, I don’t think there’s anything 

11 further that we can or should be doing. That 

12 is, with respect to the Committee, it sounds 

13 like this should be closed pending SC&A review. 

14 MR. KATZ: Well, it’s not pending,

15 Dave, I mean you’re correct, there’s nothing 

16 more for this Subcommittee to do. It reviews 

17 cases and resolves its findings.

18 So, yes, that’s something that 

19 would go on, either under Procedures or we’ll 

20 reconstitute Y-12 to address the coworker model 

21 there. But that’s independent of this 

22 Subcommittee.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right, so 

2 what should we write as we move on?

3 MR. KATZ: So I think you can make 

4 a note that --

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Referred for 

6 Procedures.

7 MR. KATZ: -- it hasn’t been 

8 reviewed, but you can close the case for review.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

10 MR. KATZ: Because you agree that 

11 there’s a problem with the case and you’ve 

12 identified the problem.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

14 MEMBER CLAWSON: And it’s being 

15 corrected by a PER review of all cases, too, is 

16 one of the things you need to put in there, 

17 David.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So what do we 

19 write in leaving this? Referred to Procedures 

20 Work Group?

21 MR. KATZ: Well, you don’t need to 

22 refer it. I mean, again, this is just a case 
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1 that you reviewed. And the procedure gets --

2 you know, the procedures get reviewed 

3 independent of this Subcommittee.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. So 

5 it’s just closed.

6 MR. KATZ: Yeah, it’s closed. It 

7 has a solution. That solution, like all 

8 solutions that NIOSH uses, gets reviewed by 

9 Procedures and by the Work Groups.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

11 MR. KATZ: And that will take care 

12 of that aspect of the issue.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

14 Well, then if that is how -- it’s closed in terms 

15 of --

16 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah, I would simply 

17 comment that the error has been identified and 

18 noted by all concerned. Agreed that it will be 

19 covered in the PER and close it.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That sounds 

21 good.

22 MR. KATZ: And can I use this break 
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1 to check. I know Mark was trying to attend, but 

2 he may not have had a chance to speak up.

3 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yeah, Ted, I am 

4 online now.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, Mark. 

6 Good, thank you.

7 MR. KATZ: Mark I just need to -- so 

8 since Mark’s on, let me just, for the record, 

9 address his conflicts, which is Mound. He’s 

10 conflicted with all individual dose 

11 reconstructions from Mound. So let me say that 

12 for the record.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

14 MR. KATZ: And then we can move on.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, 

16 excellent.

17 MEMBER RICHARDSON: Okay, and this 

18 is David Richardson. I’m going to -- if I could 

19 take this break to say, I agree. 

20 Congratulations on wrapping this one up. And 

21 I have to leave now.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And thank 
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1 you very much for being on this morning as long 

2 as you were. So, thank you.

3 MEMBER RICHARDSON: Thank you.

4 MR. KATZ: Alright, thanks a lot.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Take it 

6 easy.

7 MEMBER MUNN: Thank you, David.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: All right. 

9 If that’s finished, let’s go on. I think 294 

10 is the next one 294.1.

11 MR. KATZ: The next one --

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh no, we 

13 have observations, sorry. And we have 2 and 3. 

14 268.2.

15 MR. FARVER: Well, we should be 

16 ready to go to 269.1. We covered --

17 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah, observations 

18 are closed, I believe.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, okay.

20 MR. FARVER: We covered 268.2, we 

21 covered 268.3.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Good.
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1 MR. FARVER: And we covered the 

2 observations. I have 269.1 as the starting 

3 point.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Let’s go.

5 MR. FARVER: Okay. 

6 MEMBER MUNN: Do we have any new 

7 findings from NIOSH? Anything new on that?

8 MR. FARVER: I do not see one.

9 MEMBER MUNN: I don’t either.

10 MR. FARVER: But we haven’t 

11 discussed this anyway.

12 MR. SIEBERT: I’m sorry, this is 

13 Scott. Are you asking about 169.1?

14 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. I’m showing 

15 closed on the copy I have.

16 MR. SIEBERT: That is only SC&A’s 

17 recommendation. We haven’t discussed it yet. 

18 And we did not have additional comments past the 

19 first response. So I think we’re just working 

20 on starting on this one. We don’t have any 

21 additional comments. We’re just going to 

22 start talking through it.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, let’s 

2 --

3 MEMBER MUNN: Okay, SC&A suggests 

4 closing it, so that’s good. Alright, go ahead.

5 MR. FARVER: Okay, let me call up 

6 the file.

7 MR. CALHOUN: Scott, this is 

8 actually 269.1.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Correct.

10 MR. SIEBERT: I’m sorry, did I say 

11 something else?

12 MEMBER MUNN: No, I don’t think so.

13 MR. SIEBERT: Yes, 269.1, sorry.

14 MR. FARVER: Okay, 269.1. The 

15 finding has to do with incomplete accounting of 

16 missed dose. And I believe it was -- they 

17 assigned it for three quarters instead of four 

18 quarters.

19 MEMBER MUNN: And do we want 

20 anything done for the PoC?

21 MR. FARVER: It looks like it was 

22 about one quarter off. Like 15 millirem. PoC 
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1 was 45 percent. So it’s probably not going to 

2 impact it. It was just another QA concern. 

3 You know, something that should have been 

4 caught.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: NIOSH folks? 

6 Do you agree that we should close it?

7 MR. SIEBERT: Yes, we agree that it 

8 has minimal impact on PoC. We did review it to 

9 ensure that.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. Then 

11 I think we can close it.

12 MEMBER MUNN: Yes. Agreed.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

14 Good. Again, no objection, let’s move on.

15 MR. FARVER: Okay, 269 

16 observation. I believe this observation goes 

17 back to review of Site Profiles where we 

18 identified the lack of adequate potential 

19 environmental external exposures. And it 

20 looks like it’s just repeating that, which has 

21 been identified in SC&A’s review of Site 

22 Profile about environmental exposures [that] 
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1 may not be accurate.

2 Once again, not much that can be 

3 done here with this claim. The claim was 

4 assessed by the approved TBD. And so they are 

5 correct, questions should be handled by the 

6 Site Profile review.

7 And I would image that that’s where 

8 it would get handled at some point.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

10 MR. FARVER: Second observation. 

11 Looks like NIOSH --

12 MEMBER MUNN: But that’s --

13 MR. FARVER: Go ahead.

14 MEMBER MUNN: There really is 

15 nothing that needs to be done there. It’s just 

16 an observation that the claim was done under the 

17 TBD at the time.

18 MR. FARVER: Yes, and the second 

19 observation is pretty .... -- well, it’s not 

20 similar, it looks like they used the Y-12 

21 environmental intakes for the K-25 dose. And 

22 we thought it would have been more appropriate 
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1 to use the K-25.

2 But they are correct, the Y-12 gives 

3 a little higher dose, so it’s claimant

4 favorable.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

6 MEMBER MUNN: Comments noted and 

7 accepted.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Let’s move on.

9 MR. FARVER: 294. Incomplete 

10 assignment of missed dose for ‘57, ‘59 and ‘60.

11 MEMBER MUNN: Doesn’t look like 

12 anything more to be done from. Data entry 

13 error is noted and it’s indicated as a QA 

14 concern. No other action I can see.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right, and 

16 that lowers the exposure, right? The missed 

17 doses were zero dosimeter results, right?

18 MR. FARVER: Yes, and I believe 

19 that if you scroll down to the bottom I’ve got 

20 the dosimetry card there. So you can actually 

21 see the zeros and so forth.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. But 
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1 I don’t know that we need to look at it if NIOSH 

2 agrees. And whatever the PoC was, since it was 

3 less than 50 percent, this would only lower it.

4 MR. FARVER: Well, it would raise 

5 it.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Pardon?

7 MR. FARVER: It should raise it.

8 MEMBER MUNN: It should raise it, I 

9 think.

10 MR. FARVER: Not substantially, I 

11 mean.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I’m not 

13 quite sure why. Wait a minute, there were --

14 MEMBER MUNN: The missed doses.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 

16 Four, four and seven zeros instead of three, 

17 three and three. Oh, I’m sorry. Yeah.

18 MR. FARVER: And they identified 

19 that this was a data entry concern. Because it 

20 appears that the information was contained in 

21 the dosimetry card, but it was not entered into 

22 the dosimetry file that gets loaded into the 
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1 workbook.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

3 MR. FARVER: This is another data 

4 entry concern.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. And 

6 doesn’t change the final result, right, NIOSH 

7 folks?

8 MR. FARVER: No, but there’s 

9 probably other cases where they have the same 

10 problem.

11 MEMBER MUNN: And they indicated 

12 they’re looking for them. So that’s all we can 

13 expect.

14 MR. FARVER: Okay.

15 MEMBER MUNN: So that is closed.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I think it is 

17 reasonable to close it. Point-2?

18 MR. FARVER: Let me finish this up, 

19 I’ll be right there. Two. Incorrect 

20 cerium-144 intake value was used.

21 MEMBER MUNN: Well, that’s closed, 

22 though.
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1 MR. FARVER: No, it’s not.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No, it 

3 isn’t. These are our first reviews.

4 MEMBER MUNN: Recommendation to 

5 close. I see it.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That’s 

7 right.

8 MR. FARVER: In this case the 

9 intake was overestimated by a factor of 10. So 

10 the correct intake should have been 426 dpm per 

11 day. And they used 4,263 dpm per day.

12 So it can go either way. Sometimes 

13 they can be off by 10 or 100 in either direction.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Certainly 

15 worrisome.

16 MR. FARVER: Once again, it’s 

17 claimant favorable, it’s not going to impact 

18 the case.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That’s 

20 right. So that’s just -- then it sounds like 

21 it can be closed.

22 MR. FARVER: Yes.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright. 

2 Any concerns, anybody, that you want to raise?

3 MEMBER CLAWSON: Well, this is 

4 Brad. I’ll tell you what one of my concerns is. 

5 What are we classifying this as a finding, or 

6 is this a QA issue?

7 MR. FARVER: It’s a QA concern.

8 MEMBER CLAWSON: Right, well, you 

9 know, we’ve been pushing through the years here 

10 for quite a while. It’s just amazing to me 

11 that, I guess, you know, and I guess these are 

12 older ones. But the QA issues that are coming 

13 up on this stuff, it seems like to me it’s 

14 increased.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It’s what?

16 MEMBER CLAWSON: It’s increased. 

17 We’re seeing more and more. And that’s just 

18 bothersome to me. You know, the thing is -- and 

19 I know that as we get into the newer ones and 

20 so forth like that, we’re going to see these 

21 going down.

22 But we’re seeing so many QA issues 
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1 coming up that it just troubles me. I just 

2 wanted to make sure we don’t lose sight that 

3 part of our issues is to make sure this is being 

4 done right. And to be able to see this many QA 

5 issues does bother me.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Appropriately 

7 so. But I do trust that when we write our 

8 report, these are the kinds of issues that we 

9 will address, and be able to look at when the 

10 dose reconstructions were done.

11 And hopefully, you know, what we 

12 will find is that there may have been more in 

13 the past and that there are fewer now.

14 MR. STIVER: Yeah, this is Stiver. 

15 I’ve just put up the summary table to give you 

16 an idea of when these reconstructions were 

17 done.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

19 MR. STIVER: From 2004 to 2009, so 

20 we are kind of casting back on the past a lot.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right, good 

22 point. Okay. So let’s go back to --
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1 MR. FARVER: Okay, are you ready 

2 for 324.1?

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

4 MR. FARVER: When you’re doing the 

5 external doses, we found an extra 20 millirems, 

6 which is kind of --

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: One second, 

8 we’re waiting for material to come up on the 

9 screen.

10 MR. FARVER: Okay.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: There we go, 

12 thank you.

13 MR. FARVER: Okay. Like I said, we 

14 found an additional 20 millirem of dose for 1986 

15 that was really a neutron dose, but was assigned 

16 as a photon dose. And that was the basis for 

17 the finding.

18 After doing some digging and 

19 searching through files, you can scroll down to 

20 the bottom of the last exhibit. And that’s 

21 Exhibit C, 1986 Dosimetry Input Files.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I’m reading 
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1 the NIOSH response from this month.

2 MR. FARVER: And if you go to the 

3 one that’s marked X-10-QC, which is the first 

4 green spreadsheet excerpt at the bottom. Let 

5 me know when that’s up and I’ll start talking 

6 about it.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. I 

8 think maybe we need to scroll down.

9 MR. FARVER: This is the input file 

10 that a dose reconstructor loads into the 

11 worksheet.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

13 MR. FARVER: It contains all of the 

14 dosimeter information for all of the years, 

15 okay. At some point prior to this, the data is 

16 entered into -- I don’t think it’s entered into 

17 this spreadsheet. I think it’s entered into a 

18 program that interprets it and puts it in this 

19 format. But since we don’t really know what 

20 the process is to enter the data, I’m --

21 MR. SIEBERT: No, let’s not say 

22 that. This is Scott. We have gone over this 
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1 --

2 (Simultaneous speaking.)

3 MR. FARVER: We don’t know how they 

4 enter data into this worksheet.

5 MR. SIEBERT: The data is entered 

6 by the data entry individuals into a data entry 

7 QA spreadsheet. That data is reviewed. And 

8 then it is given to the dose reconstructor who 

9 reviews it as well. And they import it into the 

10 tool

11 MR. FARVER: Okay, so this X-10-QC 

12 spreadsheet is the very one that has been 

13 entered into by your data entry people? Is 

14 that correct?

15 MR. SIEBERT: That is correct.

16 MR. FARVER: There’s no other step 

17 where something is loaded into this 

18 spreadsheet?

19 MR. SIEBERT: Correct. The data 

20 entry people manually enter that information.

21 MR. FARVER: Okay. So the one 

22 that’s labeled X-10-QC is the data entry one. 
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1 And if you see over that the last two entries 

2 in the green are the 10 and the 20. That’s 

3 neutron data that’s entered in the wrong 

4 position.

5 Now, I don’t know how that 20 got 

6 down there with the green background, if 

7 they’re entering it.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, 

9 there’s nothing with green background on our 

10 screen. But the 10 and the 20 are there.

11 MR. FARVER: Well, it should be for 

12 the X-10-QC one. You’ll see a 20 in the green 

13 background.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, I --

15 okay, hold it.

16 MR. FARVER: This is the one that’s 

17 a --

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh yes. 

19 Okay, here it comes, yes, okay.

20 MR. FARVER: This is the file that 

21 the data entry people key the data into. And 

22 you can see there’s a 10 and a 20 under the 
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1 shallow and the deep. And it should be neutron 

2 data. 

3 So apparently they entered it 

4 twice. Two 10s and two 20s. And I don’t know 

5 how they got the green background on the 20 

6 because I tried to enter data in and the 

7 background does not carry over.

8 So that’s why I was concerned that 

9 there was some other process going on. Because 

10 I don’t know how that got there.

11 MR. SIEBERT: It got there because 

12 the data entry person highlighted it in green 

13 to point out that it’s data that is entered.

14 MR. FARVER: Okay. And, Scott, I 

15 don’t know if you know this, are there 

16 procedures that tell them how to do all this?

17 MR. SIEBERT: Our data entry folks, 

18 there’s not procedures as project procedures, 

19 but they do have working aids and guides in the 

20 data entry area that they work from, that are 

21 updated as they determine the types of data that 

22 exist for each site.
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1 MR. FARVER: And so they enter the 

2 data and then somebody comes back behind them 

3 and verifies the data. And then it goes to the 

4 dose reconstructor who also verify.

5 MR. SIEBERT: Correct.

6 MR. FARVER: Okay. So the first 

7 picture was the data entry. The second one, 

8 with the DR extension, is the one that the dose 

9 reconstructor did. And typically when we see 

10 the changes by the dose reconstructor, they’ll 

11 put them in the red type to indicate it’s a 

12 change.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. If 

14 folks could scroll -- John, if you could scroll 

15 just a little bit down.

16 MR. FARVER: That has been my 

17 experience over the years. And sometimes 

18 they’ll even put little comments in to explain 

19 why they made that change.

20 We see this a lot with the 

21 individual dosimeter readings, where they’re 

22 less than the LOD. And the dose reconstructor 
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1 will go in and manually put in a zero. Because 

2 it’s less than the LOD. We’ve seen that quite 

3 a bit.

4 But in this case, it looks like the 

5 person deleted the 10. Did not delete the 20. 

6 But added the 10 and the 20 to the neutron dose. 

7 And also corrected the annual totals. They 

8 dropped back down by 30 to 353, the correct 

9 value. So that’s what that shows you.

10 And then this is the file that got 

11 loaded into the workbook to do the dose 

12 calculations. Part of the problem -- well, 

13 what happened next was when the workbook sums 

14 up the annual dose, it sums up the quarterly 

15 doses. It doesn’t take that annual dose number 

16 of 353 that’s been corrected, and use that 

17 number. It sums up the values from the 70 and 

18 it goes all the way down like 200 rows and sums 

19 up everything that’s in the column.

20 And that’s a little bit described 

21 down there in the text. It sums up everything 

22 in the BN column.
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1 If you move down to the next 

2 workbook, the next little clip comes from the 

3 workbook itself. And under the input data tab 

4 at the beginning of the workbook -- it’s column 

5 M, it’s not column E -- it sums up everything 

6 in column BN, from row 7, which is right where 

7 the first quarter totals begin, 207 rows down.

8 So if there’s any individual 

9 dosimetry readings there, it all gets summed up 

10 and that is assumed to be the total annual dose. 

11 Well, the 20 was still there. And 

12 even though it’s down, and it’s not even with 

13 the quarterly totals, it gets summed up. And 

14 even though that’s not --

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Which would 

16 have made it 373, right?

17 MR. FARVER: Yes.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

19 MR. FARVER: But even though that 

20 dose was corrected up on annual totals, that 

21 doesn’t matter, because that’s not what the 

22 algorithm uses.
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1 And this is how it comes up with an 

2 extra 20 millirems in the final dose. Because 

3 it was input incorrectly. It was not deleted. 

4 And the algorithm isn’t just adding up 

5 quarterly doses. It’s adding up 200 rows of 

6 doses, which I believe, you know, I think 

7 there’s better ways to do that.

8 Because if you’ve got individual 

9 dosimeter readings down there, they’re all 

10 going to get totaled, plus the quarterly totals 

11 are going to get totaled. And you’re going to 

12 have an incorrect value at the end.

13 And this, for us was why we 

14 identified there could be a workbook problem. 

15 Because there’s probably better algorithms out 

16 there then to sum 200 rows when you don’t need 

17 200 rows.

18 MR. SIEBERT: This is Scott. I do 

19 want to just point out, we just discussed 

20 yesterday the Hanford tool, where we didn’t 

21 total enough lines and left data out by 

22 accident. So rather than missing data, we have 
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1 gone the other direction to ensure we have 

2 enough rows for the data.

3 You know, it is different here at 

4 X-10 because your -- oh wait -- yeah, it’s X-10. 

5 Because you generally have quarterly data 

6 earlier on. But the fact is, there’s no 

7 additional data later on there except a 

8 quarterly result. So the summation still 

9 works just fine.

10 MR. FARVER: Well, it didn’t.

11 MR. SIEBERT: The summation worked 

12 exactly --

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: The 

14 summation worked, the data entry was incorrect.

15 MR. SIEBERT: I would like to point 

16 out, as we state in our response, that the dose 

17 reconstructor should have deleted dose 20, just 

18 like they did delete the 10s when they realized 

19 those were neutron doses as opposed to deep and 

20 shallow doses.

21 We agree wholeheartedly that the 

22 data entry person put it in the wrong place. 
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1 MR. FARVER: There will never be a 

2 circumstance where you have quarterly totals 

3 and individual dosimeter readings at the same 

4 time.

5 MR. SIEBERT: You may have, as will 

6 show up sometimes, you may have a quarterly 

7 total, and they report more than one quarterly 

8 total, which actually ends up being badges. 

9 It’s a little idiosyncrasy with the way that

10 X-10 did their dosimetry in the earlier days.

11 So you may actually have four or 

12 five, quote, quarters, worth of data, although 

13 they are specifically numbers of dosimeters 

14 that were worn during those quarters.

15 MR. FARVER: Okay, but in that 

16 example, we can see that we’ve got extremity 

17 doses. Individual extremity dosimeters. 

18 Let’s assume that we have whole body 

19 dosimeters. Are we going to have whole body 

20 results down there also that are going to get 

21 summed up?

22 My concern is you’re going to have 
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1 quarterly totals, plus you’re going to have 

2 individual dosimeter readings, and it’s going 

3 to sum up everything in that column 

4 indiscriminately. And you’re just going to 

5 get a mishmash.

6 MR. SIEBERT: Well, that’s not the 

7 case because we have the data that we have. I 

8 mean, I don’t know how to respond to something 

9 that says maybe that will happen --

10 MR. FARVER: Well, no, I’m --

11 you’re telling me it’s not going to happen then, 

12 right? Because of the way they had their 

13 dosimetry structured, you will not have a case 

14 where there’s quarterly totals plus individual 

15 dosimeter readings under the deep dose?

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Look, it 

17 sounds -- maybe I’m misunderstanding, but I 

18 don’t see how any algorithm can protect from an 

19 incorrect data entry. If a person puts in a 

20 number that shouldn’t be there, then the 

21 algorithm will reflect it.

22 MR. FARVER: But my point is, if 
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1 this person had individual dosimeter readings 

2 down at the bottom where you see the extremity 

3 doses, all of the original dosimeter readings 

4 would also get totaled up with the quarterly 

5 totals. And you would have some extremely high 

6 number. Okay?

7 All I’m asking is, is that a 

8 possibility that that could ever happen? 

9 Because if that’s the case, then you could write

10 the algorithm just to total up quarterly doses.

11 And I’m sure there’s a way to do it, 

12 you could key off the identifier out under 

13 quarter in the front. It seems a bit haphazard 

14 to sum up 200 columns when there’s a possibility 

15 there could be something down in -- or 200 rows 

16 when there could be something down in row number 

17 53 that you really don’t want added.

18 MR. SIEBERT: What I can say there 

19 is the tools are developed starting from a 

20 generic point of view and adapted for each 

21 specific site. So if the generic tool has many 

22 rows of data being summed, and there’s no reason 
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1 for it to remove that large summation for a 

2 specific site, we will not do so in the tool. 

3 There is nothing wrong with the way it is. It 

4 sums correctly.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: 

6 Subcommittee Members, what are you thinking, if 

7 I may ask? We’re going back and forth between 

8 the two groups it seems to me.

9 (Simultaneous speaking.)

10 MEMBER CLAWSON: Go ahead, Wanda.

11 MEMBER MUNN: No, go ahead, Brad.

12 MEMBER CLAWSON: My issue is, you 

13 know what? I understand what Doug is saying on 

14 this. You know, I really don’t care if we got 

15 400 or 500 rows as long as everything sums up 

16 right.

17 But when we start mixing the data 

18 and the questions is, is that possible? And 

19 what it looks like to me is, yes, that could be. 

20 As Scott has put that, you know, 

21 they make these tools for each one of the sites. 

22 And I think what Doug is trying to point out to 
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1 us is that you do have a possibility of adding 

2 up these other ones, which you don’t want into 

3 the process. 

4 And if that is the case, I think what 

5 Doug’s trying to do is help a little bit here, 

6 or be able to look at maybe we need to take a 

7 look at this or whatever.

8 I do see the issue on this. And I 

9 do see what Doug is putting out to us. But, to 

10 me, that really comes down to, you know, the 

11 data entry, that’s a mistake right there. That 

12 was wrong. It shouldn’t have been done.

13 But we’re seeing another 

14 possibility here, not with this case, but there 

15 is the other possibility. And I think we’re 

16 just trying to make them aware of a possible 

17 issue here. If it’s not, then it’s not. But 

18 that’s my take on it.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

20 Wanda?

21 MEMBER MUNN: It seems to me that 

22 what we’re discussing is how can we derive a 
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1 perfect data entry system. And I don’t think 

2 we’re the first folks in the world who have 

3 attempted that. And I doubt that we’ll be the 

4 last.

5 And as long as there is human 

6 frailty involved, either in completing the 

7 software or in the entry level itself, I don’t 

8 think we’re going to achieve that. The point 

9 is duly observed that duplication of dosages by 

10 reason of different forms of entry is something 

11 that needs to be high on the awareness list.

12 But we’re dealing with literally 

13 hundreds of thousands of individual entries 

14 here. And we can only do the best we can by 

15 setting the tools up in such a way that it does 

16 the best possible approach for dealing with all 

17 those numbers.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

19 MEMBER MUNN: I am assured that the 

20 tools we have have been given an enormous amount 

21 of study and an enormous amount of attention. 

22 We continue to do that almost on a monthly 
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1 basis.

2 But I know of no way that we’re ever 

3 going to achieve our goal of 100 percent 

4 perfection in preventing any mistake in data 

5 entry. It’s obviously nice to have that goal 

6 ahead of us, and it’s one to which we should 

7 certainly aspire.

8 But I think I have enough confidence 

9 in the tools that have been developed to 

10 understand that we can’t achieve that 100 

11 percent perfection. Especially given the 

12 number of individual entries we have. If we 

13 had a half dozen entries for each of these 

14 sheets, then this would be an entirely 

15 different thing.

16 But we’re talking, as has been 

17 pointed out, we’re talking about the 

18 combination of individual monitors of one sort 

19 of exposure or another, combined with quarterly 

20 information for whole body exposures. And we 

21 have to, at some juncture, rely on the ability 

22 of the individuals who are entering this to 
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1 understand the nature of the materials they’re 

2 working with and to enter it properly.

3 We can’t do that. I certainly do 

4 not envy anybody who has that job. And I am 

5 sure that the tool that we have is one I could 

6 work with, but I still have to use some degree 

7 of judgment in what I’m doing.

8 So, yeah, I think we’ve identified 

9 the issue that’s here in this particular case. 

10 And I understand the concerns have been raised, 

11 I think they’re appropriate concerns.

12 I’m not sure that there’s a way that 

13 we here can resolve the potentials that are 

14 being discuss here. I don’t think we can 

15 resolve it. I think the folks who work with it 

16 are aware of the issues and do their best to try 

17 to address it.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I mean, I 

19 confess, I just feel like I’m not 

20 knowledgeable at that level of detail in the 

21 dose reconstruction process to feel competent 

22 that I can resolve it.
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1 MEMBER MUNN: We aren’t ever going 

2 to.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah. By 

4 the way, Mark, I don’t know if you have 

5 something, but if you do want to input in.

6 (No audible response.)

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, then, 

8 I mean, I guess that the question, the debate 

9 that’s going on between the NIOSH and the SC&A 

10 folks, do we as a Committee feel that we know 

11 enough to mandate or direct that there be a 

12 change in the NIOSH procedures?

13 And I don’t feel that I know enough 

14 to do that. And I think Doug is really arguing 

15 that the procedures ought to be changed. I 

16 think it seems to me that that may be a sensible 

17 recommendation.

18 It may be. And I don’t feel 

19 qualified to say for sure that it is. But I 

20 also don’t feel like, as a Committee Member, and 

21 we as a Committee, have enough information to

22 be able to for sure know a change is needed.
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1 And I wonder if we can’t just leave 

2 it as this is what NIOSH -- excuse me, this is 

3 what SC&A recommends. And leave it to NIOSH to 

4 look at that and consider this discussion.

5 MR. KATZ: Dave, this is Ted.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

7 MR. KATZ: That’s absolutely fine. 

8 I mean, first of all, the Subcommittee doesn’t 

9 dictate what NIOSH does in the first place. So 

10 it only makes recommendations or gives guidance 

11 where it wants to.

12 So that’s fine. But you can just 

13 leave it like that and NIOSH has the 

14 recommendation from Doug. And it can consider 

15 that in looking at its workbook.

16 And the finding itself, otherwise, 

17 is, you know, resolved. I mean, everyone is 

18 agreed upon what happened here. So you can 

19 close the finding and you can move on.

20 MR. FARVER: Well --

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Go ahead.

22 MR. FARVER: My only point was
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1 [that] you have a data entry person who enters 

2 data. You have the first control is someone 

3 checks that data to make sure it’s correct. 

4 That failed.

5 The second control is it goes to 

6 dose reconstructor, who is supposed to review 

7 all the data and correct any errors. That 

8 control failed.

9 Then we went on all the way to peer 

10 review. And that control failed. We have 

11 three controls that didn’t work. All I’m 

12 pointing out is there might be a way to prevent 

13 this whole thing in the first place by not using 

14 an algorithm that sums up 200 rows.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right, but 

16 actually the third resolution did take care of 

17 it. That is to say, you folks found it.

18 MR. FARVER: No, that’s not the 

19 peer review. We are far after that.

20 MR. KATZ: Right, that’s 

21 understood. And all your points about the 

22 failure of QA, I mean, this is not the only case 
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1 where QA has missed not just at the first level, 

2 but beyond that level, too. There are many 

3 cases like this.

4 You know, your point is taken. 

5 Your guidance has been given. It’s fully 

6 understood, I’m sure, by everybody. It 

7 certainly is by me and I’m not even an expert 

8 in this area. And it is by the ORAU folks.

9 And so that’s been transmitted, 

10 that recommendation. And that’s done. 

11 There’s nothing more to do with it.

12 And so, Dave, I think you can close 

13 this and you can move on. And there’s not more 

14 to be done here.

15 MEMBER GRIFFON: Hey, Dave?

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes?

17 MEMBER GRIFFON: This is Mark 

18 Griffon.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

20 MEMBER GRIFFON: I’m sorry, I heard 

21 you ask for me and I was on another phone at the 

22 moment. But, I think you know, the summary 
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1 there was good.

2 And I think I would recommend the 

3 way this be handled is when we do the aggregate 

4 analysis, if there are several of these, then 

5 we highlight it in our summary report. And, I 

6 mean, you know, then to make a specific 

7 recommendation for them to change something, I 

8 don’t think that’s in our purview.

9 But to point out that this problem 

10 has occurred several times and is a concern of 

11 the Board, that’s something I think we can weigh 

12 in on.

13 And that might be appropriate. And 

14 I think it’s best handled in that aggregate 

15 analysis. Because if it is true that there are 

16 several instances of this type of QA, you know, 

17 problems, then I think it’s worth highlighting 

18 in our summary report.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

20 Understood.

21 MR. KATZ: But I didn’t hear that 

22 there were several instances of this situation, 
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1 but maybe Doug can elaborate on that.

2 MEMBER GRIFFON: Right. I said 

3 if, if there are.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I agree, 

5 let’s deal with it in the report. For the 

6 purposes of this Committee, it seems to me this 

7 can be and should be closed. And I’m ready to 

8 move on. There was a recommendation of closure 

9 from the Committee.

10 MEMBER GRIFFON: Sure.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Let me move 

12 that we close it. And I will entertain 

13 objections from Subcommittee Members.

14 MEMBER MUNN: I agree, close.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

16 MEMBER CLAWSON: David, this is 

17 Brad, I agree to close it.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

19 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yeah, I agree 

20 also, Dave.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: All right, 

22 very good. It is now 12 o’clock. 11:55. By 
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1 the way, no, it’s interesting, it’s 11:45. 

2 MEMBER CLAWSON: We need 

3 independent verification on that, Dave.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright. 

5 Look, it is 11:45. We could take a five minute 

6 break now if we went on a little long in the last 

7 one. Do people want to do that, or do we just 

8 want to work on until 12:30, when we broke 

9 yesterday, [which] was a good time.

10 MR. FARVER: Dave, I’ll point out, 

11 we’ve got one more finding and two 

12 observations. And that closes out the Oak 

13 Ridge matrix.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, that 

15 seems --

16 MEMBER CLAWSON: This is Brad. 

17 I’ll go along with continue on. Let’s finish 

18 it up. It’s only 10 o’clock my time.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, that 

20 sounds good. Hearing no objection, obviously 

21 if people have to step away for a moment, then 

22 they will, as always.
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1 Fine, let’s go right ahead then. 

2 324.2.

3 MR. FARVER: 324.2, this has to do 

4 with the X-ray doses. The person had three 

5 cancers: ear, nose and kidneys. The nose and 

6 kidneys got assigned two X-ray doses for 64, as 

7 was appropriate. The ear did not get assigned 

8 those doses. Why?

9 I mean, it’s another QA issue. 

10 They should have all got the same doses and they 

11 did not. So it’s another QA concern. We don’t 

12 have any other information on that as to why it 

13 happened.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So NIOSH 

15 agrees?

16 MR. FARVER: Yeah, but there’s no 

17 way to find out why it happened. I mean, 

18 there’s got to be a reason. Either it wasn’t 

19 in the file, or it was in the file and the dose 

20 reconstructor didn’t do it. I mean, after 

21 we’ve heard about all these controls:

22 Why did it happen? Why did they get included?
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Can someone 

2 from NIOSH respond?

3 MR. SIEBERT: If I had been able to 

4 determine the why, I would have put in the why. 

5 As we discussed yesterday, when we had to cut 

6 and paste there for one of the prorations for 

7 a different cancer. If I can track down the 

8 why, trust me, I’ll let you know.

9 But in this case, the fact that it’s 

10 in some of the organs and not in another one, 

11 I cannot tell you, I just could not determine 

12 the reason that that occurred.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. I 

14 don’t know whether the -- sorry, I’m having 

15 trouble with my machine. But the designation 

16 E, I don’t know what that is. So essentially 

17 you’re saying it’s unknown. And I respect 

18 that.

19 Does that designation E that you 

20 have in there, Doug, what does that reflect? 

21 Maybe from memory, or John if you might just 

22 remember. I know we can find it and flash it 
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1 on the screen. But I’m hoping that there’s a 

2 category that says we don’t know.

3 MR. STIVER: This is John. I just 

4 had to step out for a second. What did you --

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Just 324.2, 

6 when the -- Scott just said that, you know, he 

7 doesn’t know why this was not applied to the 

8 ear. And he could not find out. I mean, he 

9 checked, he just wasn’t able to determine it.

10 So there’s no issue. This is a QA 

11 concern. But the questions is what does 

12 category E say?

13 MR. STIVER: Category Es are the 

14 QA-type concerns. Actually, let me see if I 

15 can get control back from Rose, I can put 

16 something up. Hang on for just a second, I can 

17 actually pull up a document that has those 

18 definitions here.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

20 MR. STIVER: Hang on just a minute.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sure.

22 MR. STIVER: I have too many 
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1 folders here. Alright. And let me share 

2 that. Can you all see this?

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes, thank 

4 you.

5 MR. STIVER: And you can see E is 

6 basically a quality concern. These are the 

7 data entry errors and things of that nature.

8 They go from A being the, you know, 

9 worker placement. B, the exposure scenarios. 

10 C and D being the external and internal dose 

11 models, the correct models we use.

12 And then category F, which is 

13 really, didn’t fit into any of the above 

14 categories. This is for everybody, just as a 

15 refresher, I thought I’d put that back up.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Thank you.

17 MR. FARVER: This is Doug. 

18 There’s one thing I would want to mention. For 

19 the next group of findings, 14 to 18 sets, I did 

20 not categorize using these categories. Do you 

21 want me to? And I will point out that they’re 

22 not always accurate, because I don’t always 
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1 know what’s a QA concern prior to getting a 

2 response back from NIOSH.

3 In other words, I’ve listed as a C, 

4 external dose assumptions were incorrect, when 

5 in fact is could be a quality concern. They’re 

6 not always accurate.

7 MR. KATZ: That’s okay, Doug. 

8 Because you learned later that it’s a different 

9 category, you can change the category. And 

10 sometimes it’s the Subcommittee that -- it’s 

11 their discussion that resolves exactly the 

12 nature of the problem. And then it can be 

13 changed again. That’s fine.

14 I mean, really, it’s only important 

15 so that in the summation process, we have our 

16 right little, you know, correct pools of data. 

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. And 

18 for this particular problem that we’re talking 

19 about, 324.2, E certainly fits. It doesn’t 

20 tell the whole story, but it fits. And I don’t 

21 think F -- F suggests, it’s none of the above. 

22 And certainly it is a quality concern, a QA 
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1 concern.

2 MR. FARVER: Okay.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Then I think 

4 that should close it.

5 MR. FARVER: Right. And one of the 

6 things I’ll do is I’ll go back through these 

7 matrices and make sure that everywhere we have 

8 QA concerns, we have an E category.

9 Because I just looked up above one 

10 where for one up to 394.1, it’s marked as C, 

11 which is external dose, was incorrect. Which 

12 is was, but it turns out it was incorrect 

13 because it was a QA concern.

14 So we’ll go back and make changes 

15 like that.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

17 Good.

18 MEMBER CLAWSON: Well, Doug, 

19 wouldn’t you put a C and an F on that one? It’s 

20 a QA concerned, but still a --

21 MR. FARVER: No, then we’re into 

22 double codes. And I don’t know.
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1 MR. STIVER: I mean, if you’re 

2 uncertain you can just put it in paren[thesi]s, 

3 the C, but it may be kind of a hybrid type of 

4 a category.

5 MR. FARVER: Right, but then you’re 

6 going to run into trouble when you start 

7 searching.

8 MR. STIVER: Yeah.

9 MEMBER CLAWSON: Well, one of the 

10 things I was just going to say, is most of your 

11 QA concerns are going to be tied to one of the 

12 other issues.

13 MR. FARVER: Yes.

14 MEMBER CLAWSON: That’s what I’m 

15 saying is, on a QA concern you’re going to have 

16 a double one no matter what.

17 MR. STIVER: Well, still there’s 

18 going to be an internal and external model.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah. 

20 That’s true.

21 MR. FARVER: Okay, well, maybe 

22 we’ll revise those A through F codes and expand 
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1 on the F codes.

2 MEMBER MUNN: I’m not at all sure 

3 that -- I originally thought that it would be 

4 wise for us to double code these things as well. 

5 But I’m not at all sure that that’s really true.

6 When we identify something as being 

7 erroneous with respect to internal or external 

8 dosage, then we should be looking at not just 

9 the simple mechanics, but as the basic approach 

10 being correct or incorrect. Not just the 

11 quality issue. If it’s a matter of data entry, 

12 which a large number of these turn out to be, 

13 then we’re talking about QA.

14 Other than that, if we’re -- I think 

15 we can evaluate that. It doesn’t seem to me 

16 that it’s likely to be double teamed. And as 

17 Ted pointed out, sometimes those things change 

18 after the discussion when it becomes clear that 

19 it’s just a data entry issue. These are big 

20 issues, but nevertheless, they aren’t really 

21 and truly.

22 It doesn’t matter whether it’s 
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1 internal or external or some other basic cause. 

2 If the problem is data entry, then it’s QA.

3 MR. FARVER: Okay. Now, let me 

4 point this out. We do have our initial table 

5 two codes out at the very front, that are 

6 attached to the finding number. Those 

7 identify internal, external, neutron and so 

8 forth.

9 MEMBER MUNN: Right.

10 MR. FARVER: So we still have an 

11 identifier whether it’s internal or external, 

12 or what it is. Do we just need to have a column 

13 or a check mark that says quality issue? Do we 

14 even need these A through F codes?

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, could 

16 I suggest that we’re really talking about 

17 matters that we’re going to have to really chew 

18 over carefully and more in our report.

19 MR. FARVER: Okay.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And that 

21 it’s a good initial discussion, but I think we 

22 can go on and just continue.
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1 MR. FARVER: Okay.

2 MR. STIVER: This is Stiver. 

3 Could I say one thing?

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

5 MR. STIVER: The thing to keep in 

6 mind is that the checklist really hasn’t 

7 changed much in 10 years. And we generated 

8 that A through F really kind of more of an eye 

9 towards how we might want to bend these types 

10 of findings for the Secretarial letter.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

12 MR. STIVER: I think that they’re 

13 kind of separate in that regard. So I would 

14 kind of advocate that maintaining the A through 

15 F at least for now.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah. 

17 Okay, that’s good.

18 Okay, Observation 1 on 324.

19 MR. FARVER: Observation 1. The 

20 recorded neutron doses at Y-12 during 1971 were 

21 not assigned as doses in this case. And NIOSH 

22 quotes, you know, OTIB-45, which is correct, 
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1 and RPRT-33.

2 And although these segments appear 

3 to support NIOSH’s case, it’s inconsistent with 

4 the accepted method of assigning photon and 

5 neutron missed doses across most of the DOE 

6 sites.

7 And it’s really just to point that 

8 out, that it’s an observation and it’s not 

9 inconsistent with their documents.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. Are 

11 there any other observations on 324? 

12 MR. FARVER: One more observation. 

13 When we were looking through the files, we found 

14 an incident report that lists a whole body count 

15 for the employee and had a cesium result. We 

16 could not find a record of the whole body count 

17 in the DOE files. This was just written up in 

18 an incident report with the result. And it was 

19 not included in the NIOSH calculation.

20 We did run IMBA to determine that it 

21 really was not going to have an impact on the 

22 case. This observation is merely to point out 
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1 that there was an incident report that said 

2 there was a whole body count, but a whole body 

3 count was not part of the record.

4 So I don’t know if they’re getting 

5 all the whole body counts or not. That’s all 

6 that was pointing out.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

8 MR. SIEBERT: Well, can I clarify 

9 the response?

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sure.

11 MR. SIEBERT: We did review that 

12 document and it is clear that the whole body 

13 count is not for the EE [employee], it’s for the 

14 other person who was involved with the 

15 incident.

16 MR. FARVER: And that’s all.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. Then 

18 that -- that was a useful explanation to that 

19 observation.

20 So we are now finished ORNL. And it 

21 does seem like an appropriate time. We now 

22 have only -- only -- many remaining cases --
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1 many cases at the remaining sites.

2 MR. FARVER: David, let me bring 

3 something up there.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

5 MR. FARVER: Now, this matrix was 

6 39 pages long. That matrix is about 80 pages 

7 long. So it’s going to take a very long time.

8 So maybe if you have other business that you 

9 might want to start first. And then if there’s 

10 time left, come back to that matrix. It’s up 

11 to you. But you’re probably not going to get 

12 through that matrix today.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, maybe 

14 what we should do is when we come back from lunch 

15 or breakfast, talk about plans for completing 

16 10 to 13, which is the next item on the agenda. 

17 And do we want to start to think 

18 about the report to the Board? We also are 

19 asked to choose some blind reviews.

20 MEMBER MUNN: It might be 

21 worthwhile -- we probably could get the blind 

22 reviews out of the way here fairly quickly. My 
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1 guess is the other items that you mentioned, and 

2 the ones that are on the agenda, are going to 

3 take some time. And probably involve much more 

4 discussion then the selection of cases.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

6 MEMBER MUNN: So I would suggest we 

7 address the selection of blind review cases.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: When we come 

9 back.

10 MR. KATZ: Yeah, Dave, I agree with 

11 what Wanda just said. That’s the one piece 

12 that really it would be helpful to get that out 

13 of the way so that we can get it assigned to 

14 SC&A.

15 But the rest, I mean, since 

16 everything of reporting out to the Board is 

17 predicated on getting through these sets, I 

18 still think that’s the highest priority no 

19 matter how much there is to do.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

21 Well, that makes sense. I would love to get 

22 through them. I also feel like it’s premature 
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1 to discuss the review results. We’re not going 

2 to finish all the cases today anyway, the 

3 remaining cases.

4 So why don’t we come back on the 

5 blind reviews. I’m not quite sure of the 

6 procedure for selecting those three new cases. 

7 If someone would enlighten me on that.

8 MEMBER MUNN: Well, that’s 

9 probably the first topic of discussion, would 

10 be my guess. We can either simplify it, or we 

11 can complicate it, or we can make it a group 

12 effort. But I think my personal instinct is to 

13 simplify it to the highest degree.

14 MR. KATZ: Yeah, I think someone 

15 needs to remind us of how we selected the prior 

16 ones.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That’s 

18 right. And are we selecting from -- we’re 

19 selecting from 14 through 18? Or are we 

20 selecting 19?

21 MR. KATZ: It really doesn’t 

22 matter. I mean, it’s just three cases.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

2 MR. KATZ: So I don’t think that 

3 matters so much. And obviously they have to be 

4 cases that are adjudicated. But someone needs 

5 to remind us of how we selected blind cases 

6 before. We haven’t done that many blind cases. 

7 But we selected six last year or the year before 

8 last.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

10 MR. KATZ: Whatever we did there, 

11 probably makes sense to do here.

12 MR. STIVER: Keep in mind that we 

13 couldn’t take cases from sets that have already 

14 been done. I mean, these obviously have to be 

15 new cases.

16 MR. KATZ: Right, absolutely. We 

17 can’t look at cases that have already been 

18 reviewed, but the sort of the sets that they 

19 were pulled from were much larger than the cases 

20 that were elected.

21 MR. STIVER: Yeah, you’re right.

22 MR. KATZ: That’s all I’m saying.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, I kind 

2 of remember that we kind of did this by email. 

3 But if we can do it usefully on Committee time, 

4 fine.

5 MR. CALHOUN: Can I add something 

6 here real quick?

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes, please.

8 MR. KATZ: Go ahead, Grady.

9 MR. CALHOUN: This is just kind of 

10 a little point I had about the blinds, is that 

11 they are truly not blind if you pick them from, 

12 you know, 48 to 52 percent from lists we’ve 

13 already generated. Because then you’ve got, 

14 what, you’ve got four percentage points --

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

16 MR. CALHOUN: -- that you know the 

17 answers are supposed to come from. So I don’t 

18 think you can call them blind unless you pick 

19 them at random. Just my two cents.

20 MR. KATZ: I think that’s a valid 

21 point.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, why 
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1 don’t we -- it’s five minutes after 12 here on 

2 the East Coast. So let’s take a break and then 

3 come back to discuss the blind reviews. And

4 then go on to the remaining sites.

5 MR. KATZ: I’m sorry, so when are we 

6 coming back?

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It’s 12:05 

8 Eastern Daylight Time, 1:05.

9 MR. KATZ: Oh, okay, thanks.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Thank you 

11 all, everybody.

12 (Whereupon, the meeting went off 

13 the record at 12:05 p.m. and resumed at 1:23 

14 p.m.)

15
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1 A-F-T-E-R-N-O-O-N S-E-S-S-I-O-N

2 (1:23 p.m.)

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, folks, 

4 let’s start discussing the blind reviews.

5 MR. KATZ: So let me just refresh 

6 your memories, because back in March of 2013, 

7 you did this.

8 And basically what we decided there 

9 made sense was to do -- we wanted full dose 

10 reconstructions, despite Grady’s issue about 

11 it not being totally blind in that 

12 respectbecause you already know the ballpark.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right, 

14 absolutely.

15 MR. KATZ: But the reason for doing 

16 full ones was because then that brings in all 

17 the complexity that you’d want to consider, I 

18 mean, for doing these blind reviews.

19 Really these are sort of good 

20 learning experiences for how to think about 

21 things and sort of step back and think about 

22 methods and so on.
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1 So, anyway, one of the parameters we 

2 agreed upon last time was to select the most 

3 recently adjudicated cases as possible. That 

4 was one parameter.

5 Another, we wanted full internal 

6 and external, which sort of boiled down to, I 

7 believe it’s 45 to 52 percent Probability of 

8 Causation. That ballpark gives you full ones.

9 We did not want a case that had been 

10 pulled previously. So not one out of a set 

11 that’s been pulled, because SC&A will have seen 

12 all of those and has access to all of those, in 

13 a sense.

14 And that’s it. And the only other 

15 thing that I would add for you to think about 

16 with this -- and, again, last time we had, by 

17 the way, we were shooting for six and we ended 

18 up with a pool of 12 ultimately to select from 

19 to get down to six.

20 The other thing that you just may 

21 want to consider is whether it, in general --

22 and I guess I have reserve about that after 
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1 Kathy’s remark during the break about AWE being 

2 interesting, but it seems in general the DOE 

3 facilities, the employees have much richer work 

4 histories in terms of all of their exposures and 

5 so on than at many of the AWEs.

6 But that’s something for you guys to 

7 consider. But, anyway, the other three 

8 parameters: recently adjudicated, full 

9 internal and external -- which means sort of 45 

10 to 52 percentile, you know, PoC -- and not a case 

11 that’s been pulled for one of the other sets. 

12 Those were the parameters.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: But, as I

14 recall, we had a list to look at. To choose 

15 from.

16 MR. KATZ: Right. So, let me just 

17 talk about process. So what we would do is, if 

18 those are the parameters that are good for the 

19 Subcommittee, then we would ask NIOSH to pull 

20 a set of cases large enough to be able to boil 

21 it down. So, you know, we’re shooting for 

22 three, what have you, nine, twelve cases to look 
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1 at. And then you would look at them and add, 

2 you know -- and when you look at them you would 

3 consider other matters.

4 For example, you don’t want to have 

5 all the same kind of cancer, probably.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

7 MR. KATZ: That would be considered 

8 before. And you may want to vary to have 

9 different sort of work histories represented 

10 among the three and so on.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So, Grady, 

12 does that sound reasonable?

13 MR. CALHOUN: Sure. I mean, I can 

14 do whatever you guys want to do. But, you do 

15 know going in that you’ve got seven percentage 

16 points, that’s correct?

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes. 

18 Right, we do know that. And we’ve done that 

19 before. And I thought about that during lunch 

20 break, and I just feel like that that can’t be 

21 helped.

22 MR. CALHOUN: I mean, even going 
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1 with internal and external isn’t blind. 

2 That’s not how we do them.

3 MR. KATZ: Right.

4 MR. CALHOUN: Because we want to 

5 really be blind.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, yeah. 

7 MR. CALHOUN: Whatever you want to 

8 do. I’ll give you numbers.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, let’s 

10 do it as we did before. And if you will send 

11 us, all the Committee Members, and we’ll choose 

12 three. Or if you’ll get them to Ted and Ted 

13 will.

14 MR. KATZ: Yeah, can I make a 

15 suggestion as to process, too, with respect to 

16 going forward? The last time we waited until 

17 the next Subcommittee meeting. And we could do 

18 that, but it sort of puts off SC&A and being able 

19 to get to them.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Correct.

21 MR. KATZ: But we can go that route 

22 if you want to.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I would 

2 prefer that we just send these out by email.

3 MR. KATZ: Alternatively, we could 

4 do sort of as we did for this last set. And you 

5 could send me your individual choices, in 

6 effect, for the set that you receive from NIOSH. 

7 And then I can look at all your individual 

8 choices and try, to the extent possible, to sort 

9 of take a consensus view in the selection.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Let’s do 

11 that. I don’t want to wait.

12 MR. CALHOUN: What do you actually 

13 want first? Do you want just the case numbers 

14 first, or what do you want first?

15 MR. KATZ: So, Grady, sort of like 

16 as you select for the other cases. I mean, for 

17 the Board Members to be able to select, they 

18 want all those sort of basic parameters about 

19 duration of work history, the era they worked 

20 in. You have all those already. You’ve used 

21 them before.

22 MR. CALHOUN: I’ll just send these 
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1 criteria to Beth. Because this is one of those 

2 things I don’t do and she’s there.

3 MR. KATZ: Yeah. So she knows and 

4 she’s welcome to call me and check in with me 

5 about that. But we’ve done it, and you did it 

6 back in February of last year. So you probably 

7 have a record of that, too.

8 MR. CALHOUN: Okay.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, good. 

10 And then we’ll get those and --

11 MR. KATZ: The only thing -- I 

12 suggested something, David, you didn’t respond 

13 to -- or you and the rest of the Subcommittee 

14 -- which is whether you want them irrespective 

15 of whether they’re DOE or AWE, or do you want 

16 to be selective and stick with DOE? Do you have 

17 a preference in that respect?

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, my 

19 preference would be for DOE, but let’s ask other 

20 Subcommittee Members. There’s just not that 

21 much to work with at AWE.

22 MEMBER CLAWSON: So this is Brad. 
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1 DOE is fine.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Mark and 

3 Wanda?

4 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yeah, DOE’s fine.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Wanda?

6 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah, I would prefer 

7 DOE. I think at this stage of our development 

8 we need to be looking at more recent cases. And 

9 that’s appropriate, I think.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sounds 

11 excellent. Okay, then that is folded in, DOE.

12 Are we ready to go to the remaining 

13 sites?

14 MEMBER MUNN: Sure.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, I have 

16 no preference on that, so let’s just go with --

17 I think we start with 237, some from Allied 

18 Chemical. I think those are the first. 

19 MR. FARVER: It starts with 266.1.

20 MS. GOGLIOTTI: Doug, what 

21 document are you in?

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. I see 
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1 266.1, yes, that’s certainly open.

2 MR. FARVER: Summary of findings, 

3 matrix 10 to 13, remaining sites. It would 

4 have been February of 2014.

5 MS. GOGLIOTTI: Okay, I will get 

6 that pulled up.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Here we go. 

8 Okay, there’s NTS, 266.1.

9 MR. FARVER: On our scheduled 

10 meeting, the one that got cancelled, we 

11 received NIOSH’s responses. So then we went 

12 back and put our responses to their responses 

13 and sent it back to them, and that’s what this 

14 document is.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

16 Right. Why were the 1962 photon doses in the 

17 IREP table -- scroll just a little.

18 MR. FARVER: Oh, okay, so it’s on 

19 the screen.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It is.

21 MR. FARVER: Incorrect photon dose 

22 used to determine electron dose. For the 1962 
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1 doses, the shallow dose was incorrectly applied 

2 by using 150 millirem less dose.

3 In other words, they got the deep 

4 dose done, but the shallow dose, they didn’t use 

5 the same total dose. And they came up with a 

6 different number.

7 And so our concern is why is it 

8 listing 150 millirem? Is this a data input 

9 error? You know, the photon dose is calculated 

10 correctly, but the electron doses weren’t.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. And 

12 what we’re seeing here is NIOSH’s response. It 

13 doesn’t give a reason. And, Scott, did you 

14 look for a reason and you could not find it?

15 MR. SIEBERT: We looked into it 

16 and, yeah, can’t find a specific reason why the 

17 two values are different.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: But in this 

19 context, I don’t see that that will result in 

20 a significant change. I’m not even talking 

21 about flipping. I’m just talking that it is a 

22 very small -- we’re talking about a two percent 
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1 correction. Three percent.

2 MR. FARVER: Well, the point is why 

3 are they using different doses? I mean, it’s 

4 just wrong. Something’s wrong somewhere.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

6 MR. FARVER: And it’s wrong to just 

7 ignore it.

8 MR. SIEBERT: I agree. I’m going 

9 to look further in to see if I can find any more 

10 information as to why those two numbers are 

11 different.

12 I’m not saying to close it, by all 

13 means. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m 

14 saying I will take more time to look into the 

15 specifics on this one to see if I can dig 

16 anything else out.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That’s fair 

18 enough. That’s appreciated. So, 266.1 will 

19 remain open. Let’s go on.

20 MR. FARVER: Okay, 266.2. NIOSH 

21 failed to account for the for the beta 

22 uncertainty for years 1966 to ‘72. The NIOSH 
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1 response says that the uncertainty for beta 

2 dose is included in the factor of one, which is 

3 consistent with the guidance in OTIB-17, 

4 Section 3.

5 When we looked at the Technical 

6 Basis Document under the section for beta 

7 dosimetry with film badges, it specifically 

8 said with shallow dose estimates from ‘66 

9 through ‘86, the dose reconstructor should 

10 double the reported value to ensure 

11 favorability to claimants and to account for 

12 uncertainties.

13 Also we could not find any reference 

14 or anything in OTIB-17 regarding the beta 

15 uncertainty from film badges. Or any 

16 statement that would supersede the 

17 site-specific guidance.

18 MR. SIEBERT: Okay. And what 

19 we’re saying here -- and I’ve looked at this. 

20 The language in the section that you’ve pulled 

21 from had more information than just the last 

22 sentence.
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1 It also says the value of a factor 

2 of two is an estimate of the range of 

3 uncertainty based on knowledge of the reported 

4 responses and the characteristics of the 

5 dosimeters. And it’s presented for general 

6 information only.

7 MR. FARVER: So why does it say that 

8 the dose reconstructor should double the 

9 reported value to insure favorability to 

10 claimants?

11 MR. SIEBERT: I’m just telling you 

12 what the TBD says in the earlier portion of it, 

13 that it’s for general information only.

14 MR. FARVER: So I guess the dose 

15 reconstructor can select which portions they 

16 want to use.

17 MR. SMITH: This is Matt Smith with 

18 the ORAU Team. With respect to the section of 

19 the NTS TBD, it was written before OTIB-17 was 

20 an active OTIB.

21 It’s probably difficult to discern 

22 that unless you were go back through each 
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1 revision of the NTS TBD and see which sections 

2 change and which stayed the same.

3 But Scott’s correct. The 

4 recommendation was made during a time early on 

5 in the project where literally not much was 

6 known about what the uncertainty for beta 

7 should be.

8 OTIB-17 came online in the 2005 time 

9 frame. It’s been reviewed through the 

10 Procedures Committee several times in several 

11 different ways. And I believe it’s standing 

12 right now with no issues on it.

13 Within OTIB-17, which is the 

14 approach that is then taken by the DRs to do 

15 claims during this era at NTS, there’s a wide 

16 array of claimant-favorable assumptions that 

17 are made. The DCF is set to one. The missed 

18 dose, for instance, for a situation where we had 

19 a zero for open window and a zero for shielded 

20 dose, we assign that dose based on the LOD for 

21 electrons, but then assign it to the photons, 

22 30 to 250 keV energy range, which is a more 
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1 favorable range to assign it to, in terms of 

2 PoC.

3 The bottom line on this is the 

4 language in the NTS TBD should be updated to 

5 reflect that OTIB-17 came into effect and is now 

6 the guidance document that DRs use to deal with 

7 shallow dose.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. It 

9 seems to me that you’re suggesting that we refer 

10 -- effectively the suggestion is to refer it to 

11 the Procedures Committee.

12 Because you’re just saying 

13 something is out of date and that it was not in 

14 the previous reviews, it was not taken out. 

15 You believe it should be.

16 MR. SMITH: As I took a look at 

17 this, my recommendation would be to update the 

18 pertinent section of the NTS TBD to reflect that 

19 OTIB-17 is the relevant guidance to be using for 

20 this time period.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

22 MR. CALHOUN: This is Grady. I 
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1 don’t think that that needs to be referred to 

2 the Procedures group. Because we can fix that 

3 TBD. But, additionally, if you look in the 

4 references of that actual dose reconstruction, 

5 TIB-17 is referenced as a document that would 

6 be used to do the shallow dose calculation.

7 MR. FARVER: Okay, Grady, so 

8 wouldn’t the technical basis reference [be] 

9 also?

10 MR. CALHOUN: Sure.

11 MR. FARVER: Okay. Well, that’s 

12 got different information in it. My point is 

13 you’ve got conflicting guidance.

14 MR. CALHOUN: Yeah.

15 MR. FARVER: So when you’ve got 

16 conflicting guidance, which do you use? Do you 

17 use the general OTIB, or do you use the 

18 site-specific?

19 MEMBER MUNN: Well, it seems the 

20 recommendation should be to update the TBD so 

21 that it’s not in conflict with the OTIB.

22 MR. CALHOUN: Right. I agree with 
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1 that.

2 MR. FARVER: I understand that. 

3 But, I mean, as general practice, so that we 

4 know for future dose reconstructions, when 

5 you’ve got conflicting guidance, which one do 

6 you use? The OTIB or the site-specific 

7 guidance?

8 MEMBER MUNN: Well, you know, 

9 ideally what one needs to do is resolve the 

10 difference. And that’s what I think our 

11 recommendation should be in this case, is 

12 request that NIOSH change that guidance.

13 I understand your question, it’s 

14 just that it ought to be a question that does 

15 not arise more than once. And having arisen, 

16 it should immediately generate an effort to 

17 resolve the difference. We shouldn’t need a 

18 subcommittee to do that.

19 MR. FARVER: Well, Wanda, maybe for 

20 this specific instance it won’t come up again. 

21 But there are instances where the guidance 

22 conflicts. And which one do you use?
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1 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah, I understand 

2 your concern. And you’re absolutely right. 

3 This is not the first time we’ve seen that.

4 But what I’m saying is, it doesn’t 

5 seem to me that it should require anything other 

6 than NIOSH’s acknowledgment that they see 

7 there’s a conflict and move whatever needs to 

8 occur to correct that, correct it immediately.

9 MR. KATZ: Right. To address the 

10 other part of Doug’s question, though, in their 

11 doing dose reconstruction case reviews where 

12 they run up into this. Doug, what I would 

13 suggest is that you contact NIOSH and ask them 

14 which one they did use.

15 I mean, I guess in this case they did 

16 use OTIB-17 and they were both referenced. But 

17 it was hard for you to sort out which one they 

18 used maybe.

19 But, anyway, feel free to contact 

20 NIOSH and get clarification in a case when you 

21 run up against this.

22 MR. FARVER: Well, it’s not so much 
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1 which one they use, it’s what hierarchy.

2 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah.

3 MR. KATZ: Yeah, but there’s no 

4 hierarchy. They’re not intending to have 

5 conflicting guidance. So, I mean, it 

6 happens, I understand what you’re saying. But 

7 that’s not the intent.

8 So they don’t have a hierarchy to 

9 ignore one over the other. They just have 

10 errors where they have some conflicts.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: NIOSH has 

12 the ability -- NIOSH is authorized to just 

13 change the TBD?

14 MR. KATZ: Yeah, I mean they’re 

15 NIOSH’s TBDs. And they change them as they 

16 need to. They change them all the time.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Um-hum.

18 MR. KATZ: Yeah.

19 MEMBER MUNN: With or without 

20 guidance from someone else.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

22 MR. KATZ: Absolutely.
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1 MR. FARVER: I’ll give you the 

2 example.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

4 MR. FARVER: Like I think PROC-60, 

5 X-ray frequency, I believe there is general 

6 guidance on frequency. I believe there is site 

7 specific guidance. And I believe it says 

8 somewhere about site specific guidance [it] 

9 should take precedence.

10 MR. KATZ: And it does in that case.

11 MR. FARVER: Well I understand. 

12 But I’m just saying, what is its intent? Is 

13 site specific guidance in the TBD supposed to 

14 take precedence over OTIBs?

15 Because I’m not sure how we can 

16 audit everything if we’re not sure which one 

17 it’s supposed to be.

18 MR. CALHOUN: I would prefer that 

19 the site specific documents contain that which 

20 we use.

21 MR. FARVER: Okay.

22 MR. CALHOUN: And in the case where 
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1 we haven’t updated it yet, we made a decision. 

2 But I would prefer that eventually the site 

3 specific documents are the ones that we go to 

4 first.

5 MR. FARVER: Okay.

6 MR. CALHOUN: It makes most sense 

7 to me.

8 MR. FARVER: As you know, that was 

9 the basis for this finding, was that we found 

10 something in the site specific guidance. And 

11 it appears to be a conflict that can get 

12 resolved.

13 But I want to make sure in the future 

14 when we come across this, that we write it up 

15 appropriately. And don’t just, you know, 

16 don’t miss it.

17 Yeah, I think this is, you know, 

18 it’s good to settle it this way. There’s not 

19 a conflict. We should work it out. But I mean 

20 that’s --

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah. I 

22 think we have agreement.
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1 MR. FARVER: So we’re going to work 

2 on modifying the TBD to --

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

4 MR. FARVER: Reflect certain 

5 guidance.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay folks?

7 MEMBER MUNN: Hopefully NIOSH will 

8 agree to that.

9 MR. BARTON: This is Bob Barton, I 

10 have a question. TIB-17 isn’t site specific to 

11 NTS though, is it? It’s just a general 

12 application of shallow dose document.

13 MR. KATZ: No, that’s the whole 

14 point, Bob.

15 MR. BARTON: Okay.

16 MR. KATZ: In this case the generic 

17 bumped the site specific because the site 

18 specific’s out of date.

19 MR. BARTON: Okay.

20 MR. KATZ: That’s the whole point.

21 MR. BARTON: Alright, thank you.

22 MR. KATZ: You’re welcome.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, I 

2 think we can close and go on.

3 MR. FARVER: Okay, closed. And 

4 then 266.3, missed electron dose was not 

5 assigned for ‘57 through ‘65. Okay. And--

6 okay, I’m looking down the italics under the 

7 SC&A section.

8 For ‘57 through ‘65, there were no 

9 reported shallow doses. Therefore an electron 

10 to photon ratio of one to one is applied for 

11 these years. And they’re reasonable 

12 assumptions.

13 And this is to calculate the 

14 recorded electron dose based on the record --

15 based on the recorded photon dose, they’re 

16 assuming an electron dose of one to one. Okay.

17 So if you have 4.3 rem of photon 

18 dose, you would also add in 4.3 rem of, you know, 

19 electron dose.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Electron 

21 dose.

22 MR. FARVER: Okay. Our point is 
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1 that you should do the same thing for the missed 

2 dose because there’s still missed dose there. 

3 So you would take the missed photon dose, use 

4 a one-to-one ratio and call it missed photon 

5 dose.

6 I mean that’s what we think is 

7 reasonable based on this situation where 

8 they’re -- where you’re doing it for the 

9 recorded dose.

10 Now if you follow OTIB-17, you’re 

11 not going to do that because there is no shallow 

12 dose. There would be no shallow missed dose, 

13 which seems to be in conflict with what you did 

14 when you assumed the electron dose.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 

16 Please scroll down just a little bit. Thanks. 

17 NIOSH?

18 MEMBER MUNN: Excuse me for 

19 interrupting the thought here, but I’ve lost my 

20 Citrix connection again. And I am wondering 

21 whether this matrix was sent to us recently?

22 MR. FARVER: Friday.
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1 MEMBER MUNN: Friday, alright. 

2 And what was the title?

3 MR. FARVER: I sent you, I think it 

4 was four matrices maybe. One, two, three --

5 no, four or five.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Five.

7 MR. FARVER: This is called, it 

8 would be under summary of findings matrix -- oh, 

9 10 to 13 remaining sites. February, 2014.

10 MEMBER MUNN: Okay, thank you.

11 MR. SMITH: Well this is Matt Smith 

12 with the ORAU team. I didn’t specifically look 

13 at this item. But into the process of 

14 assigning missed dose, we do not want to assign 

15 double missed dose, would be my quick response 

16 to this.

17 The one to one should be applied 

18 when we have a recorded dose situation. But as 

19 you’ve noted with OTIB-17, we don’t take the 

20 tact of applying both missed photon dose and 

21 missed electron dose together.

22 With OTIB-17 guidance, we do, as I 
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1 mentioned earlier, categorize that missed dose 

2 in a more claimant favorable manner by calling 

3 it out in the 30 to 250 photon category. But 

4 without looking at this a little deeper, I don’t 

5 have much more to say on that one.

6 Well Scott, do you have anything to 

7 add?

8 MR. SIEBERT: No, I agree with you 

9 Matt. And this is -- realistically this is a 

10 question about OTIB-17, not about this claim.

11 MR. FARVER: Correct. And for 

12 this case --

13 MR. SMITH: I know a long time ago, 

14 we realized we were going to have situations 

15 where you literally have a zero, zero. Zero 

16 open window, zero shielded. So what should you 

17 call that missed dose? Would it be called 

18 electrons or photons?

19 I know in this particular era we’re 

20 doing the one-to-one ratio. But typically, as 

21 I mentioned before, what we would do in that 

22 situation is use an LOD value associated with 
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1 electron data.

2 So you know, we’re going claimant 

3 favorable on that assumption. And then 

4 further going claimant favorable and 

5 categorizing it to the 30 to 250 keV photons for 

6 assignment in the IREP.

7 MR. FARVER: And this is for a skin 

8 dose, is what this case is. Two skin doses. 

9 You may want to take a look at this, this might 

10 be a NTS specific issue.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Want to take 

12 -- is that something you want to do? Matt or 

13 NIOSH?

14 MR. SIEBERT: Well, we’re kind of 

15 deferring to -- I’m guess deferring to Grady 

16 on this. Because this is -- as I said, this is 

17 a question about OTIB-17. This is not a 

18 question about NTS or this claim.

19 MR. CALHOUN: Yeah, it seems like 

20 the question here is whether or not you or 

21 whoever believes that application of that 

22 mid-level photon rather than beta is okay or 
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1 not. And that’s what’s dictating TIB-17, 

2 that’s what we found.

3 So really the question is, is TIB-17 

4 wrong? So that’s what we followed. But I 

5 don’t know if you want to refer that to the 

6 Procedures group, or what do you want to do on 

7 that one?

8 MR. KATZ: This Ted. I think 

9 that’s where that belongs. And Dave, I think 

10 we can just write a little email to Procedures. 

11 Wanda’s on it, she chairs it, just asking them 

12 to look at this.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I’d be most 

14 open to that. Wanda, [what] do you feel like?

15 MR. FARVER: It is an NTS issue also 

16 because for this specific time period, it 

17 effects NTS. There are probably other sites 

18 that are effected in other time periods.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right, which 

20 is why one would send it to the committee.

21 MR. KATZ: So what I can do is I can 

22 excerpt this little piece of the transcript 
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1 when it is produced, Dave and committee. And 

2 send that along with a cover email from me on 

3 behalf of the Subcommittee just asking the 

4 Procedures Subcommittee to consider this.

5 I mean that would be the way to do 

6 this.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah. 

8 Wanda you think --

9 MEMBER MUNN: Yeah, we’re 

10 delighted to be of any assistance at all.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. And 

12 then Mark and Brad, do you go along with that?

13 MEMBER CLAWSON: This is Brad. 

14 That’s fine. This is also one of our site 

15 issues that we’re trying to bring to a 

16 resolution to the site.

17 MEMBER GRIFFON: That sounds good 

18 Dave.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

20 Let’s go ahead.

21 MR. FARVER: So did we close this 

22 out for us?
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

2 MR. FARVER: Okay. 266.4, unable 

3 to verify plutonium intake. And that was 

4 because we didn’t get the file. There was no

5 acute documentation supporting the 1959 

6 plutonium intake.

7 MR. SIEBERT: Okay, I have a 

8 response for that. There is no acute intake 

9 file. That is not what we are stating in the 

10 response.

11 The way the dose reconstructor did 

12 is work around to the CAD program. The CAD 

13 program uses either acute intakes or annual 

14 full-year electronic intakes. This obviously 

15 is neither because it’s from March 3 of a year 

16 to April 6 of a year. And you cannot do those 

17 directly in CAD.

18 So what the dose reconstructor did 

19 to get the numbers using CAD was they took the 

20 product intake that was calculated in IMBA for 

21 that basically month time frame. Added up the 

22 intake across that whole chronic time frame 
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1 together. And assigned that as a single acute 

2 intake in the CAD program.

3 It’s just a way of using CAD as 

4 opposed to having to run everything through 

5 IMBA.

6 MR. FARVER: Okay. Were those 

7 files included?

8 MR. SIEBERT: There is no file. 

9 That’s what I’m saying. The IMBA files -- let 

10 me rephrase that. The IMBA file, which would 

11 be plutonium 239 estimated dose, was included 

12 in the claim. And the CAD file, which is CADW, 

13 underscore, the claim number. Both of those 

14 were included in the submittal, yes.

15 So if you go back to the IMBA file, 

16 you’ll see that the intake is 4,454 dpm per day. 

17 And if you multiply that over the chronic time 

18 frame, you get just over 151 thousand dpm. And 

19 that’s what was assigned as an acute in CAD.

20 MR. FARVER: And that line of

21 thinking or anything is not included anywhere?

22 MR. SIEBERT: There’s no reason to 
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1 do so. It’s the calculation of the dose.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It doesn’t 

3 involve any OTIB or anything. Well it sounds 

4 like a reasonable procedure. The question is 

5 whether --

6 MR. FARVER: Except when you’re 

7 trying to audit.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

9 MR. FARVER: And you’re looking for 

10 chronic intake and supporting information. 

11 And you don’t find it. You find acute intake.

12 MR. KATZ: Right. And I think the 

13 solution to this, to the quandary for Doug or 

14 whoever happens to be auditing it, is when you 

15 run into a situation where there’s just missing 

16 information, is to ask NIOSH to explain so that 

17 you can hunt it down.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And how do we 

19 -- how do we manifest that stuff here now?

20 MR. KATZ: Well no, I think that’s 

21 a -- just a process for SC&A. In these cases 

22 where there’s some question of where some data 
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1 came from, go ahead and ask -- go ahead and ask 

2 NIOSH while you’re doing the audit.

3 For the missing information. It’s 

4 just a process thing for us here.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

6 MR. FARVER: Okay. I mean I think 

7 that’s a little -- it’s not a true audit then. 

8 Because normally in an audit, they’re going to 

9 supply you the information and you’re going to 

10 go with what they give you.

11 MR. KATZ: It’s fine with me, Doug,

12 to do it this way. To ask questions when we’re 

13 -- there’s simply a matter of not understanding 

14 where some missing information is. It’s just 

15 -- it doesn’t infect the audit in any way in 

16 terms of its integrity.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Unless one 

18 were to look back at it years later.

19 MR. KATZ: No, because the audit is 

20 going to have a review of all the information 

21 directly then. They’ll know where this 

22 information came from, how it was done. And 
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1 they can then determine whether it was done 

2 appropriately.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Shall we 

4 close it. Sounds like we might. Doug?

5 MR. FARVER: I guess.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah. 

7 Let’s close 266.4 unless somebody from the 

8 Subcommittee wants to raise an issue.

9 MEMBER CLAWSON: Well, this is 

10 Brad. I understand what Ted’s saying. I 

11 understand what Doug’s saying. But there --

12 we’ve got into this before.

13 If we’re doing an audit on this and

14 the information isn’t there, that really to me 

15 is a problem. And I know, Ted, that you said 

16 well, you know, you can call them and just ask 

17 them: Well how did they get there?

18 Well I think that’s kind of out --

19 I think that’s stepping outside the bounds of

20 the audit.

21 MR. KATZ: Well I mean Brad, it’s 

22 not. It’s not. All the data was in the files. 
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1 The problem here was SC&A didn’t understand how 

2 they got from the data to a calculation that was 

3 made.

4 But all the data for this file and 

5 all the work for this file was there. Except 

6 for that the person who did the calculation did 

7 not write down what he was doing when he took 

8 data from one source and applied it in another 

9 part.

10 Now that’s not -- there’s nothing 

11 wrong with the dose reconstruction in that 

12 sense. It’s just a problem for the audit 

13 because there’s not clear information about 

14 every step that was taken along the way.

15 But that’s not a flaw to the dose 

16 reconstruction. And I am perfectly fine with 

17 SC&A calling NIOSH in these cases, which aren’t 

18 that frequent, but where they find that they 

19 just have lost a trail in effect of how things 

20 were done, and getting clarification.

21 And if SC&A finds in a case that 

22 there’s something that should have been written 
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1 down, they can still put that in their audit. 

2 But it’s not a finding in terms of a flaw of the 

3 outcome of the dose reconstruction case.

4 So they can put in their audit 

5 report you know, we didn’t understand how he got 

6 this. We called NIOSH and this is how they got 

7 it, if you want a record of that.

8 But in my opinion, that record 

9 itself has very little value down the road to 

10 anyone. But it only has value in terms of being 

11 able to do these audits efficiently.

12 MR. FARVER: I would prefer that in 

13 situations where we cannot verify a dose from 

14 the dose reconstruction report, or the files 

15 provided, that we write it up as a finding and 

16 let it come out here that oh, okay, it was 

17 because the dose reconstructor didn’t include 

18 all the work. Or maybe a file is missing.

19 But I’d rather write it up as a 

20 finding and let it come out during this process.

21 MR. KATZ: Okay, and my opinion is 

22 that we waste a lot of time on these things. 
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1 Because they’re not problems with the dose 

2 reconstruction case per se. They’re just an 

3 issue for processing the audit.

4 So I would rather not waste the 

5 whole Subcommittee’s time on these matters.

6 MR. CALHOUN: Well this is Grady. 

7 And my opinion on that is it’s not a finding. 

8 Because our goal with this program is to provide 

9 quick dose reconstructions that are on the 

10 right side of compensation.

11 It’s really not one of our 

12 priorities to make them easy for an outside 

13 agency such as yourself to audit. As long as 

14 it’s clear what our people do; for our people 

15 to do it, that’s our goal.

16 So because it wasn’t as easy for you 

17 to find something, really can’t be held up as 

18 a finding. Because then once it’s done on this 

19 list, it gets tallied up as a problem. And 

20 really the problem is that it just wasn’t clear 

21 to the auditor.

22 MR. KATZ: Okay, I’m happy to have 
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1 more discussion about this with SC&A. But I’m 

2 fine.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well let’s 

4 just close -- let’s just close .4. And .5 is on 

5 the screen.

6 MR. FARVER: Okay again the IMBA 

7 intake does not match the CADW intake. There 

8 was an IMBA file for an iodine-131 intake. It 

9 shows 39 million picocuries for the intake.

10 The intakes that were put into the 

11 CADW report were 392 thousand picocuries 

12 intake. They were off by 100. Human error.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It sounds 

14 like NIOSH -- well it sounds like NIOSH 

15 acknowledges that that’s correct.

16 MR. SIEBERT: Yes, we agree.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay then 

18 let’s close it. It’s not really an issue for 

19 us to discuss. .6

20 MR. FARVER: 266.6, NIOSH 

21 underestimated the missed neutron dose. This 

22 is a little bit unusual because this employee 
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1 was involved with -- we’ll have to understand 

2 a little bit about the employee.

3 He was a radiology field operations 

4 person. That puts a little bit more emphasis 

5 on this. And was involved in, gosh, nearly 700 

6 nuclear tests. And we thought that the neutron 

7 dose was a little underestimated since the only 

8 assigned doses were ‘61, ‘62, 1980.

9 Out of 30 years of employment and 

10 participation in nuclear tests. Okay, so that 

11 was the basis for the finding. I did read their 

12 response. And there is a section in the NTS 

13 TBD. And I believe it’s an attachment or 

14 appendices -- attachment D, okay.

15 We read through the analysis. And 

16 what they did was reasonable based on their 

17 analysis.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. Then 

19 let’s close. Any objection?

20 MR. FARVER: No.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

22 Good. 292.
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1 MR. FARVER: Okay, next case is 

2 292.1. Okay. Inappropriate assignment of 

3 ‘61 to ‘66 missed photon doses. I believe if 

4 I remember right, there was a section in the TBD 

5 where there were overlapping dates.

6 So it went from one period from ‘61 

7 to ‘66, you did one thing. And then I believe 

8 it said from ‘66 to something else you do 

9 something different. So there was kind of an 

10 overlap.

11 And basically that is what prompted 

12 this finding. It has been changed in the 2010 

13 revision.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

15 MR. FARVER: It’s been corrected. 

16 But I believe it was an overlapping date.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah. Well 

18 it sounds like there’s agreement again and can 

19 close. We can close. Let’s go on.

20 MR. FARVER: 292.2, inappropriate 

21 dismissal of occupational medical exams. 

22 Okay.
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1 MR. SIEBERT: Doug, would you like 

2 me to go ahead and explain this?

3 MR. FARVER: Go ahead, I’m trying 

4 to find the file.

5 MR. SIEBERT: Yeah, that’s fine. 

6 This really has to do with how we interpret 

7 NTS’s responses on whether medical records are 

8 available. NTS does make a differentiation 

9 between what they call “not readily available”, 

10 which means they didn’t retrieve the medical 

11 file.

12 If that was the case we would use a 

13 default frequency. Or they also notified 

14 things as “does not exist”, which means they did 

15 search through the medical records and there 

16 are no X-rays in the medical records. In that 

17 case we would follow the actual X-ray record, 

18 which would be to assign no X-rays.

19 So it’s understanding exactly what 

20 NTS is saying when they’re responding as to how 

21 to assess the X-ray.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.
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1 MR. FARVER: So, what I’m looking 

2 at is the records. So when there are no 

3 records, you would go and assign from the 

4 frequency that’s in the NTS TBD, correct?

5 MR. SIEBERT: No, if there’s -- it 

6 depends on how they tell us that there’s no 

7 records.

8 MR. FARVER: Okay.

9 MR. SIEBERT: If they say -- if they 

10 state -- let me look at that working again. If 

11 a state does not exist, or specifically no 

12 records, that is correct, we will assume that 

13 there are no records available and they did 

14 look. And NTS took good care of their record, 

15 with their medical records and so on. Which 

16 means the individual did not get X-rays.

17 If it’s marked as did not -- or not 

18 readily available, that means NTS did not go 

19 back into the records to pull out the 

20 information. And if we don’t have that 

21 information, then we will use the default 

22 frequency.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That makes 

2 sense. And SC&A agrees, right?

3 MR. FARVER: I probably will for 

4 this case just because it’s a telephone person.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

6 MR. FARVER: A maintenance person.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Then let’s 

8 close it.

9 MR. FARVER: Is that something that 

10 needs to be clarified in the TBD? I’m just 

11 throwing that out there.

12 MR. SIEBERT: And that’s a valid 

13 question. I need to -- I have not had a chance 

14 to look to see if it’s been updated in the TBD 

15 or the DR guidance. And I am verifying that 

16 that information is available to the dose 

17 reconstructors. If it is not yet, I’m going to 

18 ensure it is.

19 MR. FARVER: Okay, because that 

20 would be useful.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

22 MR. SIEBERT: Oh, Doug, I’m sorry, 
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1 I just found out, it is in the DR guidance right 

2 now.

3 MR. FARVER: Okay.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Good. Then 

5 we’re ready to go on. Sorry, I’m trying to push 

6 ahead. Observation 1, 292.

7 MR. FARVER: Hang on until I get 

8 this updated Dave.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sure.

10 MR. FARVER: I wanted to get all 

11 that information in there. And then it’s in 

12 the guidance document so it doesn’t happen 

13 again.

14 Okay. Observation 1. Okay, this 

15 is just pointing out that little --

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

17 MR. FARVER: Without the 1.25 

18 correction factor.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

20 MR. FARVER: Fixed in the revised 

21 addition.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.
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1 MR. FARVER: Okay.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That’s okay.

3 MR. FARVER: Observation number 2 

4 points out what I said, this is a telephone 

5 person. And it is really hard to determine if 

6 he was a contract employee or not. And it just 

7 wasn’t clear to me from the file or the CATI 

8 information.

9 So it’s not really anything 

10 negative, it’s just pointing out that it’s not 

11 clear.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright.

13 MR. FARVER: Observation number 3 

14 just points out a little discrepancy between 

15 the TBD and a couple of tables and that NIOSH 

16 corrected that issue. It looks like one was 

17 off by a factor of 10.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

19 MR. FARVER: Okay, now down to 

20 293.1 and there are findings of lack of 

21 assignment of 1964 environmental dose. Oh, 

22 okay. There’s a time period during the atomic 
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1 testing where they did not use -- did not assign 

2 atomic, or did not assign environmental dose 

3 because it just wasn’t accurately, you know, 

4 the ambient dose.

5 The more recent version of the NTS 

6 TBD explains it a little better than the version 

7 that was in place at the time. So we should not 

8 have this issue again.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

10 MR. FARVER: Okay, what prompted it 

11 was the employee had no external dosimetry for 

12 1964 and as of other years when there was no 

13 external dosimetry, he was assigned an 

14 environmental dose, will count for some 

15 external dose. But this was not done in ‘64.

16 That’s what prompted the finding. 

17 But according to the TBD for that time period, 

18 they did not assign an ambient dose.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: The employee 

20 was not on site in ‘64.

21 MR. FARVER: Yes.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 
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1 Well it sounds like there’s no conflict here.

2 MR. FARVER: No.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So can we 

4 close it?

5 MR. FARVER: Sure, yes.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

7 MR. FARVER: Okay, that was it for 

8 293.

9 MR. SIEBERT: This is Scott, I’m 

10 sorry. Since we’re looking at starting on 

11 Allied Chemical, is there any way we could take 

12 a comfort break about this time?

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, we 

14 certainly can and I appreciate your saying 

15 that. It slipped my mind.

16 Okay, it is 2:20.

17 (Whereupon, the foregoing meeting 

18 went off the record at 2:20 p.m. and 

19 went back on the record at 2:30 

20 p.m.)

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes, we're 

22 ready to go.
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1 MR. FARVER: 237.1 Allied 

2 Chemical. The short story is the Dose 

3 Construction Report shows a DCF of one was 

4 applied to the doses when in fact a .873 was 

5 used.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

7 MR. FARVER: Okay. Acknowledge 

8 that. And it happens. It's a reporting 

9 error. I suggest closing.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes. And 

11 there's agreement on that. There's no issue 

12 about the calculation. There's an issue about 

13 the communication within it.

14 MR. FARVER: Correct.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Close. 

16 Okay 237.

17 MR. FARVER: 237.2 The methods 

18 used to calculate the shallow dose.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: One minute. 

20 We're just waiting for the screen to --

21 MR. FARVER: Okay.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: There we 
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1 are, thank you. 237.2.

2 MR. FARVER: 237.2 is a method used 

3 to calculate the shallow dose and is not 

4 consistent with the [inaudible] then in the 

5 Dose Reconstruction Report.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Let me 

7 scroll up just a wee bit.

8 MR. FARVER: Does John Mauro happen 

9 to be on the phone?

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: He was 

11 earlier.

12 MR. FARVER: Okay. Grady do you 

13 know anything about NIOSH going to revisit this 

14 issue as part of a review of the Site Profile?

15 MR. SIEBERT: Grady, I'll answer 

16 that if you want me to.

17 MR. CALHOUN: I always want you to,

18 Scott.

19 MR. SIEBERT: No. The problem 

20 that comes out of this is that when you guys 

21 started looking at OTIB-17, you were looking at 

22 a gaseous diffusion plant example is my 
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1 assumption.

2 The fact that the dosimetry and beta 

3 dose being recorded at Allied Chemical is 

4 different than the gaseous diffusion plant 

5 doesn't mean there's anything wrong with 

6 OTIB-17 or its application. We just need to be 

7 clear how we're applying it.

8 In this case, we applied it 

9 appropriately with the electron doses because 

10 we were using the beta and skin results. It 

11 depends on the year of interest with the site.

12 So there's nothing wrong with the 

13 way the claim was done that I can see. However 

14 I can agree that it probably could be more 

15 clearly stated in the Technical Basis Document.

16 MR. FARVER: Okay. I actually 

17 understood your response. I didn't understand 

18 ours. Okay.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So this is 

20 clear, this is -- I don't see what we're 

21 keeping, why we would want to keep it open. It 

22 sounds like it's closable.
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1 MR. FARVER: Well, I understand. 

2 Like I said, I didn't understand our response. 

3 That's why I was asking if John was on the line. 

4 He wrote it.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: If you like, 

6 we can come back to that when John gets back on 

7 the line.

8 MR. FARVER: Okay.

9 MR. STIVER: I sent him a note 

10 asking him to call in.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. Why 

12 don't we do that, folks. So we'll come back to 

13 237.2.

14 MR. FARVER: The next one is 

15 something that looks almost similar. 237.3 is 

16 inappropriately assigned, unmonitored, 

17 external photon doses, as missed dosed.

18 And NIOSH does give a good 

19 explanation. And our response is that yes, 

20 that's a reasonable response and the TBD will 

21 be revised with clear guidance.

22 That's the part I'm not sure about. 
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1 But I mean that's -- we don't have a problem with 

2 their response.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And the TBD 

4 will be revised with clear guidance. NIOSH 

5 agrees to this?

6 MR. FARVER: I don't know if that's

7 true or not. That's why I was waiting for my 

8 AWE person to get on the phone. Let's keep this 

9 open also.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, until 

11 John comes.

12 MR. FARVER: Yeah, I'm just not 

13 comfortable with it.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. I 

15 understand. Let's keep going on, next one, 4.

16 MR. FARVER: 4, incomplete 

17 accounting of external doses. This is the same 

18 as 237.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, right, 

20 okay. Let's go to 5.

21 MR. FARVER: This looks like it's 

22 similar to the first one.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It certainly 

2 does.

3 MR. FARVER: In the form of what was 

4 in the report and what was actually done. So 

5 it was calculated correctly. So I would 

6 suggest closing this one.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. You 

8 want to close 271.5?

9 MR. FARVER: 237.5, yes.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I mean 237, 

11 okay, 6 -- 237.6. So I'm not quite sure why the 

12 PoC statement is even in here.

13 MR. SIEBERT: I can state that.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

15 MR. SIEBERT: This whole claim was 

16 reworked later on because of an additional 

17 cancer and went over 50 percent. So what we're 

18 saying, it's already been compensated, so we 

19 didn't look at the impact of PoC on every piece.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And that's 

21 reasonable. Okay, let's close.

22 MR. FARVER: Okay.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: 7.

2 MR. FARVER: 237.7, I believe a 

3 missed uranium dose was underestimated. This 

4 appears to be the wrong unit. The correct 

5 intake unit should have been picocuries per 

6 day. And when it went into the CADW program, 

7 it was entered as picocuries per year.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Anybody from 

9 NIOSH comment on that?

10 MR. SIEBERT: Well, I'm sorry, I 

11 was just waiting for a question. Yes, I mean 

12 I can explain this a little bit clearly. I'm 

13 sorry, I wasn't sure if Doug wanted to say 

14 something.

15 MR. FARVER: Well, the other thing 

16 I was going to add is our question: How did 

17 those -- if the units were changed, why did the 

18 dose go down? Or why is the IREP unchanged?

19 MR. SIEBERT: Right, which is a 

20 very valid question. Let me clarify a little 

21 bit. Even -- and we agree that for the missed 

22 dose, those units were entered incorrectly.
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1 It's just when we corrected it and 

2 looked at the impact of that, the reason the 

3 overall skin dose did not change, which means 

4 IREP didn't change as much, is the fact that 

5 although missed dose was underestimated, even 

6 when we corrected it, when you compare it to the 

7 fitted dose, remember you only assign the 

8 fitted dose or the missed dose, whichever one 

9 is larger.

10 There's only a single year where the 

11 missed dose is larger than the fitted dose. 

12 And it's barely larger. So there's very 

13 little -- there's very little overall impact to 

14 this issue. Although it does impact the missed 

15 dose itself. When you compare it, there's very 

16 little overall impact.

17 Does that make sense to you?

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Um-hum.

19 MR. FARVER: So when you were 

20 comparing your missed doses with your fitted 

21 doses, and you had the units incorrect, there 

22 were probably more missed doses that were 
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1 higher than the fitted doses?

2 MR. SIEBERT: No. The missed 

3 doses as done originally were too low. If it's 

4 picocuries per year, and should have been 

5 picocuries per day --

6 MR. FARVER: Okay.

7 MR. SIEBERT: The missed dose 

8 should have been 365 times larger. So when we 

9 did apply that, and we re-compared it to the 

10 fitted dose, it had very little impact, because 

11 in only one of the years was [it] larger than

12 this dose.

13 Originally none of it – for years 

14 [the fitted doses] were larger than this dose.

15 MR. FARVER: Okay. So you 

16 eventually used the fitted dose from the 

17 corrected one.

18 MR. SIEBERT: Correct. We used 

19 the fitted dose originally. And when we 

20 reexamined it, the fitted dose was larger for 

21 all but one year anyway. So only one of the 

22 years out of all the years changed.
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1 MR. FARVER: But you're going to be 

2 bounded by one of them.

3 MR. SIEBERT: Correct.

4 MR. FARVER: Yeah. Okay, I 

5 understand.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

7 Let's close. Sounds like closing is 

8 appropriate.

9 237.8. By the way, John Stiver, if 

10 you -- if you might give another call to John 

11 Mauro.

12 MR. STIVER: Okay, will do.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Definitely 

14 want to because we're nearing the end here of 

15 this case.

16 MR. FARVER: Okay, 237.8, 

17 questionable exclusion of positive bioassay 

18 data for estimated intake of non-uranium 

19 facility.

20 These non-uranium intake rates are 

21 based on uranium intake rates discussed 

22 earlier. It's the same as 237.6, which we --
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Closed just 

2 a moment ago.

3 MR. FARVER: Which we've talked 

4 about and closed.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So --

6 MR. FARVER: I thought it sounded 

7 pretty similar.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I think it 

9 does.

10 MR. FARVER: I would suggest 

11 closing this.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I would 

13 agree. And again, anybody on the 

14 Subcommittee, if there are any concerns, just 

15 say so.

16 Okay. 237.9

17 MR. FARVER: Similarly. We have a 

18 missed non-uranium dose [that] was 

19 underestimated, which is going to be the same 

20 as 237.7 for the uranium dose. The question 

21 being, you know since the units changed 

22 drastically, why didn't the doses change 
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1 drastically?

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And we just 

3 got an explanation for that.

4 MR. FARVER: It was because of the 

5 fitted dose.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So this one 

7 should be closed, I believe.

8 MR. FARVER: Yes.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. So .9 

10 should be closed.

11 DR. MAURO: Doug, this is John 

12 Mauro. I was asked to --

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Ah, very 

14 good.

15 DR. MAURO: I was asked to call in. 

16 There may be something I can help with.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Welcome.

18 DR. MAURO: Okay, yes. Good 

19 afternoon.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Let's go 

21 back to 237.2.

22 MR. FARVER: This is Allied 
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1 Chemical.

2 DR. MAURO: Okay.

3 MR. FARVER: And I don't know if you 

4 have anything to look at or not.

5 DR. MAURO: I don't have anything in 

6 front of me. No. But if you just tell me what 

7 the -- because I was associated -- I worked on 

8 Allied Chemical with I think, Bill Thurber and 

9 perhaps Hans.

10 If you let me know what the issue is, 

11 maybe I can help. Maybe not.

12 MR. FARVER: Okay. Let me go back 

13 to that finding, 237.2.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It's on our 

15 screens.

16 MR. FARVER: The finding is that 

17 the method used to calculate the shallow doses 

18 was not consistent with the dose 

19 reconstruction. And in the write up, the SC&A 

20 write up, we wrote that NIOSH's approach for 

21 assigning electron dose for external dosimetry 

22 appears to be based on the assumption that all 
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1 positive, open window dosimetry readings 

2 comprised an electron dose greater than 15 keV.

3 And while they’re 

4 claimant-favorable, it does not follow the 

5 DR-cited guidance provided in OTIB-17. And 

6 then we cite the guidance in OTIB-17.

7 DR. MAURO: Okay.

8 MR. FARVER: The NIOSH response is 

9 that the section that was quoted in our report 

10 is for gaseous diffusion plants, it doesn't 

11 apply to Allied Chemical. In the case of 

12 Allied Chemical, exposure reports for ‘68 and 

13 ‘77, the site reported beta results in ‘68 and 

14 beta and skin results in ‘77.

15 In both cases the beta doses were 

16 used as the non-penetrating dose component.

17 DR. MAURO: Okay, so they're making 

18 a case that the low energy photons, I think that 

19 would be -- we're reconstructing the skin dose. 

20 I'm just trying to help out here.

21 And that the standard method is 

22 OTIB-17, which I believe you go through a 
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1 decision process by assigning either electron 

2 or photon exposures to that dose is the process. 

3 I'd have to go read it again.

4 But they're saying that no, at 

5 Allied Chemical, and they may be right, that 

6 allof the open window dose is the beta. Is that 

7 the position they're taking?

8 MR. FARVER: Beta for ‘68 and then 

9 beta and skin dose -- skin results were reported 

10 in ’77 with a different dosimeter.

11 DR. MAURO: Right. But they're 

12 claiming that -- they're assuming that it's all 

13 beta and is being responsible for the open 

14 window exposure. Is that what -- as opposed to 

15 that saying whatever the protocol is in 

16 OTIB-17.

17 If I'm understanding this 

18 correctly. I may not be helping right now, but

19 I'm trying to -- I did not make that comment. 

20 This is -- I would have recalled making that 

21 comment. It probably was made by someone else.

22 All I'm doing is trying to help out. 
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1 If that's in fact what NIOSH said.

2 MR. FARVER: Well, what I didn't 

3 understand was our response. It says it 

4 appears that NIOSH is going to revisit this 

5 issue as part of a review of the Site Profile.

6 DR. MAURO: And do they agree with 

7 that?

8 MR. FARVER: Is that true?

9 DR. MAURO: Well, I guess we have to 

10 ask NIOSH that.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

12 MR. SIEBERT: Yeah, it's a valid 

13 question. This is Scott.

14 We are, as you know, in the midst of 

15 updating the TBD or the Site Profile as we 

16 speak. What we are stating is yes, that it is 

17 correct the way it is.

18 The site is reporting actual beta 

19 results in ‘68. And then the beta and skin 

20 results in, I guess, ‘77, as it has to do with 

21 this specific claim.

22 We have in the draft that we are 
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1 presently reviewing, we have added a separate 

2 table to the TBD that lists the reported dose 

3 quantities and the time frames to clarify for 

4 the dose re-constructors what is appropriate in

5 what time frame.

6 DR. MAURO: Okay. So it sounds 

7 like you don't -- I mean are you attempting to 

8 close this issue at this time?

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, we'd 

10 like to.

11 MR. FARVER: Yes.

12 DR. MAURO: And -- but we haven't 

13 seen the answer though. I mean in other words 

14 SC&A has not yet seen [what] that new approach 

15 is doing to this skin dose that you're 

16 developing. It has not been issued yet.

17 MR. SIEBERT: It's not -- it's not 

18 different then we previously were doing.

19 DR. MAURO: Oh, okay. So nothing 

20 is changing.

21 MR. SIEBERT: Right.

22 DR. MAURO: So you're saying the 
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1 approach that you're using right now you're 

2 going to keep, but you're -- you know, so 

3 nothing will change, but you have some other 

4 material that you're putting forth to support 

5 this approach?

6 MR. SIEBERT: And to clarify how to 

7 approach it during that time frame so these 

8 questions don't arise. That is correct.

9 DR. MAURO: I got you.

10 MR. SIEBERT: Okay.

11 DR. MAURO: Well, all I can say is 

12 that you know, I certainly believe you. That 

13 that's the case.

14 But normally, what happens with 

15 something like is that if in fact your rationale 

16 for doing it the way you're doing it is not 

17 provided, or your working on it. And it hasn't 

18 really been issued as: Okay, here's the 

19 rationale why what we did is a better 

20 explanation or technically supports the 

21 position you're taking. We usually look at 

22 that.
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1 So I mean I'm not sure how you'd like 

2 to handle this. I believe that you probably 

3 are comfortable with your new explanation. 

4 And that if we had a chance to look at it and 

5 think about it a little bit, we'd probably come 

6 back and say everything's fine.

7 But I hate to do that because we 

8 really haven't seen it. You know, right now 

9 you're saying trust me, you know, everything is 

10 going to be fine.

11 MR. SIEBERT: No, we're not.

12 DR. MAURO: I don't know how --

13 MR. SIEBERT: We're not saying that 

14 the Allied Chemical calculation is correct as 

15 it stands.

16 DR. MAURO: Right. And it had a 

17 reason for it that had not yet been explained.

18 MR. CALHOUN: I don't think that's 

19 a reason to keep the finding open.

20 DR. MAURO: I mean right --

21 MEMBER CLAWSON: Well then tell us 

22 what you've -- tell us what you've done new 
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1 then. Tell us what is changed from this.

2 MR. CALHOUN: I think it's up to you 

3 to tell us what's wrong.

4 DR. MAURO: Well, all we were 

5 saying is the methodology that you followed, of 

6 course right now I'm winging it, I mean --

7 MR. SIEBERT: Sure.

8 DR. MAURO: I'm winging, I'm 

9 basically saying the comment I think stems from 

10 looking at how you reconstructed the dose based 

11 on, I guess, the combination of the open window, 

12 the penetrating, the non-penetrating portion 

13 of the dose.

14 The way -- there's a protocol you 

15 follow in OTIB-17, which we have reviewed and 

16 approved. I mean OTIB-17's clean.

17 And from the comment that I just 

18 heard, it sounds like that you didn't quite 

19 follow OTIB-17. You did something a little 

20 different. And you're saying right now that 

21 you have a rationale for that. That you know, 

22 that we haven't seen yet.
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1 And I guess that's all I'm saying is 

2 that it sounds like we're on a reasonable 

3 process, but can we close out on that basis? 

4 Normally we wouldn't.

5 I mean I'd find -- normally we would 

6 say well, you know, let’s see the write-up on 

7 the rationale why you deviated from OTIB-17.

8 MR. SIEBERT: Well John, this is 

9 Scott. I'm looking at your finding. And the 

10 finding specifically says we did not follow 

11 OTIB-17, page 26.

12 DR. MAURO: Okay, like I say, I 

13 didn't write that, but okay, keep going. 

14 I'm --

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, go 

16 ahead.

17 DR. MAURO: Help me help you.

18 MR. SIEBERT: Okay, and that's 

19 okay. And then page 26 is one of the examples 

20 on how to assess skin dose. It's Attachment D. 

21 It's an example of how to assign skin dose for 

22 gaseous diffusion plant cases.
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1 DR. MAURO: Oh, okay. Okay.

2 MR. SIEBERT: It's not a gaseous 

3 diffusion plant.

4 DR. MAURO: Ah, so you're saying 

5 that the -- by the way, as I said, this is 

6 not -- I'm just trying to get with you. I 

7 didn't make that comment, but I understand what 

8 you're saying.

9 So you're saying basically that the 

10 comment we had really was misplaced.

11 MR. SIEBERT: Correct.

12 DR. MAURO: We were making a 

13 comment that would be applicable to a gaseous 

14 diffusion plant, but not at Allied Chemical.

15 MR. SIEBERT: That is correct.

16 DR. MAURO: And I believe that. So 

17 you do follow OTIB-17, I guess that's the point, 

18 is that what you're saying, as it applies to 

19 Allied Chemical?

20 MR. SIEBERT: I'm going to say 

21 that's correct. I'm going to be more 

22 comfortable if Matt Smith can weigh in on that. 
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1 But I'm not sure if he's had a chance to look 

2 at this one specifically.

3 MR. SMITH: I have not. This is 

4 Matt. I haven't immersed into the Allied 

5 Chemical Site Profile. But I'm more familiar

6 with sites that are not described in the 

7 attachments of OTIB-17. The same methodology 

8 is used with each of these sites.

9 And typically what they'll do is 

10 they'll cite the TBD -- I'm sorry, they will 

11 cite the OTIB-17 as a methodology. And then 

12 explain in the TBD itself what it is intended 

13 to do.

14 And it would seem logical for Allied 

15 Chemical that the non-penetrating dose would be 

16 classified as electron dose for this site, not 

17 low-energy photon.

18 DR. MAURO: And I would agree with 

19 that. I have to say, from what I'm hearing, and 

20 I know you guys like to move through these. I 

21 don't want to tie you up.

22 We made -- we made reference to that 
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1 page 26 that was in error, because it didn't 

2 apply. And what I'm hearing from you is that 

3 when it comes to Allied Chemical and the nature 

4 of the material handling, was it mostly 

5 uranium? I'm thinking back to so many sites.

6 Your position is that no, beta dose 

7 would by far dominate the exposure. And that's 

8 the appropriate assumption to make.

9 If that's your position, I would 

10 agree with it.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: So, and I 

12 think we called you back because Doug was not 

13 clear why SC&A had written what SC&A wrote.

14 So I think we are moving to 

15 clarification and my feeling is that we can 

16 close this.

17 DR. MAURO: I would not argue with 

18 that. I think that our comment was misplaced. 

19 I, you know, because we made reference to an 

20 example that really didn't apply to Allied 

21 Chemical. 

22 And what we're hearing from NIOSH is 
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1 no, that they assumed that they did follow 

2 OTIB-17. And as applied to Applied Chemical, 

3 you would assume it's all data.

4 I can't argue with that. So I mean 

5 it sounds like we should withdraw that comment.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. So 

7 we're ready to close. And what we might want 

8 to do is, if you would just like for one moment, 

9 I think 237.3 had a similar issue. And could 

10 we go to that?

11 MR. FARVER: 237.3

12 inappropriately --

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No.

14 MR. FARVER: Unmonitored external 

15 photon dose as a mixed missed dose. The --

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I guess it 

17 was that TBD would be revised. And that's 

18 true.

19 DR. MAURO: In a situation like 

20 this where we may have had a comment and NIOSH's 

21 response is yes, we agree. And a TBD is about 

22 to be revised. Usually, I know on the 
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1 Procedures Subcommittee, we call it “in 

2 abeyance”.

3 That means in effect we agree that 

4 there's a need to fix something. And things 

5 are being changed. We're changing one of our 

6 procedures, if that's what I'm hearing.

7 You don't actually close it until 

8 that particular change is made. But you folks 

9 may feel that you know that that's good enough. 

10 Is that what I'm hearing, that you --

11 MR. KATZ: John, that's right. 

12 That applies to Procedures. But it doesn't 

13 really apply for Dose Reconstruction.

14 DR. MAURO: But am I correct that 

15 NIOSH agrees that there's a need to address and 

16 make some changes here using some procedure 

17 that's about to be revised?

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Scott or 

19 Grady?

20 MR. SIEBERT: Generally in the 

21 past, and Grady can correct me if I'm wrong. 

22 But generally in the past once we said in this 
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1 Subcommittee, if we admit there's something 

2 that we want to update in the TBD, I believe it's 

3 just been closed and agreed to that we will do 

4 so and move forward.

5 In this case, I mean, technically 

6 the TBD is correct the way it is, it's just not 

7 as clearly stated as it could be. And that's 

8 what we're clarifying in this version of the TBD 

9 that we're updating right now.

10 DR. MAURO: Oh, okay. So it's not 

11 that your making any changes, you're just 

12 giving better explanations that would justify 

13 what you're [doing] --

14 MR. SIEBERT: The 1969 data is not 

15 as clear as it could be, the description in the 

16 TBD and we are updating that as of today, yes.

17 DR. MAURO: And you feel that after 

18 you make that update it will become -- it will 

19 be easier to understand the approach you've 

20 used?

21 MR. SIEBERT: Correct.

22 DR. MAURO: I see.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sounds 

2 reasonable.

3 DR. MAURO: I'm okay. I mean I 

4 can't argue with that.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. So 

6 let's close that one as well. And I think those 

7 were the -- did we have any further ones Doug 

8 that you wanted to ask John to help us with?

9 MR. KATZ: We didn't close yet 

10 because it was perhaps similar to 237.4.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, yeah.

12 MR. FARVER: 237.4 is the same 

13 response --

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Same issue.

15 MR. FARVER: .3 except it applies 

16 to the shallow dose.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. So we 

18 should close.

19 MR. FARVER: Yes.

20 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And 5 we have 

21 closed I believe.

22 MR. FARVER: Correct.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. Then 

2 I think we're ready to move on to the next case.

3 MR. FARVER: Ready to move on to 

4 what is observation.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

6 Alright. And maybe John you'll be with us for 

7 this observation.

8 DR. MAURO: If you want me to sit 

9 tight with you for a while, I'd be glad to.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No, I think 

11 it was just this one case.

12 MR. FARVER: Well we've got another 

13 Allied Chemical case, so.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, well 

15 fine.

16 DR. MAURO: Okay. I'll stay on the 

17 line.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Thank you.

19 DR. MAURO: Okay.

20 MR. FARVER: Observation 1, NIOSH 

21 claimed organ dose from dosimeter readings used 

22 to central estimate DCF for AP. And a 1.3 
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1 multiplier to insure claimant favorability.

2 So this method is 

3 claimant-favorable, [but] the basis for 

4 selecting a 30 percent bias over some other 

5 value was not provided in the narrative.

6 MR. SIEBERT: This is Scott. It's 

7 pretty much the same sort of issue. It's not 

8 wrong in the Site Profile. But it's not as 

9 clearly defined as we would like.

10 So it's the same thing. We are 

11 clarifying exactly how to be assessing those 

12 type of things and factors and uncertainty in 

13 the present version of TBD.

14 DR. MAURO: Did you -- you 

15 said -- this is John. Did you say, we're 

16 talking about the AP dose conversion factor. 

17 And the way in which you used it was to use the 

18 central -- or I guess they're using a triangular 

19 distribution.

20 I'm just trying to be helpful here. 

21 When I go into the dose conversion factors and 

22 OCAS-001, IG-001 -- usually for the dose -- we 
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1 are talking about the dose conversion factors, 

2 is that correct?

3 MR. SIEBERT: Yeah, John, I'm going 

4 to stop you, because that's not the issue. The 

5 issue is you get a factor of 1.3 to basically 

6 use an overestimating assumption of the errors 

7 rather than doing an actual error calculation 

8 around the readings themselves.

9 It's not the DCF. That was just 

10 mentioned as part of the process that comes out 

11 of OCAS-IG-01.

12 DR. MAURO: I misunderstood. So 

13 you're just using the 1.3 as a fixed value 

14 rather than a distribution? In other words 

15 rather than put a distribution?

16 MR. SIEBERT: That's what was done 

17 in this case, correct.

18 DR. MAURO: That's not often 

19 though. My experience in doing these DRs, and 

20 Doug help me out a little bit here, I know that 

21 sometimes when the calculations are being done, 

22 they'll put in a distribution for the exposure. 
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1 Or they multiply it by 1.3 and put in a fixed 

2 value for external exposure readings.

3 Correct me if I'm wrong.

4 MR. FARVER: Nope. You're pretty 

5 much correct. Usually every time we see the 30 

6 percent is under the occupational medical 

7 section.

8 DR. MAURO: Okay. And this is for 

9 occupational external exposure?

10 MR. FARVER: This is -- yes. This 

11 is for the photon.

12 MR. FARVER: Oh, I see, okay. Doug 

13 I'm going to have to defer to you. Because you 

14 probably -- you've seen a lot more of these than 

15 I have. I've seen the 1.3 multiplier without 

16 putting the distribution in.

17 My recollection is that it was, yes,

18 done. And may have been done for x-rays. I'm 

19 not quite sure whether it was also done for 

20 occupational external exposure, you know,

21 based on whatever the film badge results are.

22 MR. FARVER: Well I mean it's like 
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1 sometimes it's not wrong. But it's not 

2 normally what they would do.

3 DR. MAURO: Yeah.

4 MR. FARVER: I mean it is just an 

5 observation, so we really don't have to do 

6 anything.

7 DR. MAURO: Yeah.

8 MR. FARVER: We were just pointing 

9 out that this isn't normally what you do.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. And 

11 I think that is an observation, so in progress 

12 if you want to keep it there. But the reality 

13 is we don't act on observation.

14 I'm ready to go on.

15 MR. FARVER: Okay. We've got one 

16 more observation. Observation 2 has to do with 

17 the medical dose.

18 MR. SIEBERT: I'm sorry. I was 

19 unclear, was that closed then?

20 MR. FARVER: Well, it's an 

21 observation.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It's an 
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1 observation. So we don't --

2 MR. SIEBERT: Okay then. I'm just 

3 making sure. Okay. Yeah, go ahead.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, so 

5 we're finished.

6 DR. MAURO: Well I'd just like to 

7 ask a little bit.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sure.

9 DR. MAURO: Given that it's 

10 unusual, I mean, was there any reason in this 

11 particular case where something was done 

12 differently than what you normally do? Or 

13 just, these things happen?

14 MR. SIEBERT: That's a valid 

15 question. While you can't tell, but I've been 

16 frantically looking to grab a case here real 

17 quick.

18 My suspicion is that we didn't have 

19 a best estimate tool for that site at the time, 

20 which would have applied the errors. So they 

21 may have used the 1.3 as a work around until we 

22 had a tool because this is not a small site. 
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1 But there's not nearly as many claims from this 

2 site as, you know, your Hanford's or your 

3 Savannah River's. So getting a best estimate 

4 tool may not have been as pressing.

5 That's really my first guess on 

6 that. But that's the kind of situation it 

7 would not surprise me if we did that sort of 

8 thing.

9 DR. MAURO: I mean that sounds like 

10 a reasonable explanation because I know when I 

11 check things, I don't work with a tool. I 

12 usually say, okay, I'll do it by -- I try to do 

13 everything by hand and see if I can closely 

14 match your numbers.

15 And what I would do is just what you 

16 did. You know, say listen, let's work with a 

17 1.3. So to me I think that you're saying we had 

18 a circumstance where we didn't have a tool, so 

19 we used the -- what I would call a plausible 

20 bounding number as a fixed value rather than a 

21 distribution.

22 MR. SIEBERT: Yeah.
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1 DR. MAURO: So I need that, okay. 

2 Alright.

3 MR. FARVER: Okay. Observation 2. 

4 The presumed lateral exposure would have 

5 increased the employee annual skin dose by a 

6 factor of 2.5, which would have been more 

7 claimant-favorable instead of using a PA exam.

8 Okay, that was observation. It 

9 would have been more claimant-favorable. 

10 NIOSH gives their explanation that basically 

11 the Allied Chemical Site Profile, we specify 

12 the time to predict for an exam, should be 

13 based on current values, which at the time was 

14 PA chest exam. And there was no information 

15 that lateral exams were conducted as part of the 

16 medical program at Allied Chemical.

17 DR. MAURO: I'd be happy to jump in 

18 on that. I agree.

19 MR. FARVER: Okay.

20 DR. MAURO: You don't normally 

21 assume that you have lateral unless there's 

22 affirmative evidence. You usually default to,
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1 you know, you don't automatically go to the 

2 lateral.

3 The only time I ever, when I do a 

4 review, use lateral, is when it's said that yes, 

5 we have evidence that lateral -- because those 

6 are higher than the PA. But if they're silent 

7 regarding that, and you don't have information 

8 of the type of, whether it's lateral or PA, I 

9 think it's appropriate to use PA.

10 Lateral sort of like only comes into 

11 the picture when someone says that's what we 

12 did. So I mean I sort of, I guess, I agree with 

13 NIOSH's position.

14 MR. FARVER: Well, it was just an 

15 observation.

16 DR. MAURO: Oh yeah. Right. 

17 Okay.

18 MR. FARVER: And then the third 

19 observation has to do with uranium intakes. 

20 NIOSH applied an unnecessarily complex 

21 approach in assigning the acute intakes. This 

22 may not have always been claimant favorable.
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1 NIOSH agrees that assigning 

2 multiple intakes is likely overly complex. We 

3 could have considered more closely indications 

4 of incidents in the bioassay records.

5 I don't know, I'm not sure what's so 

6 overly complex, but once again, it was just an 

7 observation.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, 

9 alright.

10 MR. FARVER: Ah, one more. 

11 Observation 4. SC&A believes the employee may 

12 have been denied health compensation as an 

13 unintended consequence of the restrictions 

14 imposed by the SEC. And containment is 

15 feasible to reconstruct the employee dose for 

16 non-uranium radionuclides during the AWE 

17 period.

18 It looks like that was an SEC 

19 determination. I mean a --

20 DR. MAURO: Is that an observation?

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That's an 

22 observation right?
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1 MR. FARVER: It's an observation.

2 DR. MAURO: I would have made that 

3 a finding. You're saying that there was a dose 

4 that they did not calculate that they could have 

5 calculated and at least given some dose.

6 That was -- because very often, when 

7 I review these cases, every effort is made for 

8 a guy with skin cancer. I assume this is a skin 

9 cancer?

10 MR. FARVER: I believe so.

11 DR. MAURO: Yeah. Every effort 

12 I've seen, you know, in NIOSH's dose 

13 calculations, whenever they can, for a person 

14 who's been excluded from the compensated group 

15 under an SEC, like a skin or a prostate cancer. 

16 Every effort is made where they could to try to 

17 assign dose, you know, wherever they can.

18 And if this is a circumstance where, 

19 let's say it's a residual period were there are 

20 protocols that you could default to to try to 

21 assign some dose, normally that's done. And to 

22 try to give the guy as much as you can.
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1 Usually what happens is when you 

2 don't do that is, let's say the SEC is because 

3 you can't reconstruct the inhalation of 

4 thorium. That's like a classic one.

5 MR. FARVER: Okay.

6 DR. MAURO: And then don't even try 

7 to assign anything. You can't. You can't. 

8 There's no way for you to even come near it.

9 But I don't know the reason for 

10 whatever the SEC was granted, but if it's 

11 possible to do the residual period based on, you 

12 know, some of these uranium default approaches 

13 like TBD-6000 or OCAS-70, my experience is 

14 normally NIOSH would try to assign some dose 

15 there if they could.

16 MR. CALHOUN: John, this is Grady. 

17 I didn't respond to this one. But based on what 

18 our response is, it looks to me like this SEC 

19 Evaluation Report specifically states that the 

20 internal can't be done from another facility 

21 during that time.

22 DR. MAURO: The internal during 
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1 operations? And as a result, you're saying 

2 that extends to the residual period also? Is 

3 that what --

4 MR. CALHOUN: Yeah --

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I wish 

6 that -- could somebody recall for me, I thought 

7 we turned down the Allied SEC. The Board did. 

8 Is that correct? Or did we grant an SEC for 

9 some period?

10 MEMBER MUNN: I'm sure it was 

11 granted if it was voted on. I don't know, but 

12 I can check on that.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: If somebody 

14 would. And then are we talking about someone 

15 who has exposures beyond the SEC period? Or 

16 insufficient exposure during the SEC period to 

17 be compensated and we're then trying to 

18 calculate what exposure is. I'm just unclear.

19 MR. FARVER: I believe this applies 

20 to what non-uranium intake.

21 MEMBER MUNN: Probably.

22 DR. MAURO: Yeah, that rings a 
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1 bell. SEC was granted for -- they could 

2 reconstruct uranium, but not the non-uranium. 

3 We granted on that basis.

4 That does -- I'd have to go back and 

5 look at this -- but that sounds like something 

6 I've seen before.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

8 MR. SIEBERT: I would like to point 

9 out -- this is Scott. In the finding -- or not 

10 the finding, the observation, they're 

11 specifically talking about the time period up 

12 to ‘76 which is still the operational period.

13 MR. KATZ: Right. They're talking 

14 about the operational period.

15 DR. MAURO: Okay.

16 MR. SIEBERT: I'm sorry, I'm just 

17 reading as I'm going along here. I apologize.

18 But yes, the observation's saying 

19 that we -- we being SC&A -- contended it's 

20 feasible to reconstruct the EE doses from 

21 non-uranium radionuclides during the AWE 

22 period, which is the operational period.
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1 And that question has already been 

2 answered in the SEC that states we cannot during 

3 the operational period.

4 DR. MAURO: Oh. Oh, okay. I mean 

5 if that's -- if that in fact is the basis, or 

6 one of the bases for the SEC, you know then our 

7 comment is not right.

8 MR. SIEBERT: Right.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

10 MEMBER MUNN: It looks like there 

11 is an SEC for Allied.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Pardon?

13 MEMBER MUNN: From January 1, ‘59 

14 to December 31, ‘76. There is an SEC for Allied 

15 Chemical.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

17 DR. MAURO: And is this for 

18 non -- and the reason, the rationale, is they 

19 can't reconstruct non-uranium exposures? I 

20 wouldn't be surprised if that's the case.

21 Usually you can reconstruct uranium 

22 exposures because of TBD-6000, but you have --
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1 MR. SIEBERT: John that's correct. 

2 That is the reason.

3 DR. MAURO: Oh, okay. And the 

4 comment we had is that we think you can do 

5 non-uranium. Well, not if that's the basis for 

6 the SEC. So I don't know when we made that 

7 comment, but it sounds like that's right.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Then we 

9 should move on.

10 DR. MAURO: Yes.

11 MR. FARVER: I know sometimes that 

12 if you have data for the employee, they'll --

13 DR. MAURO: Oh, yeah.

14 MR. FARVER: Use it.

15 DR. MAURO: Absolutely Doug. Hey 

16 I'm sorry if I'm stomping all over the place. 

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No, no, no.

18 DR. MAURO: Yeah, I do that on the 

19 phone. But yeah, you're right. If this fella 

20 had data, biologic data that somehow you could 

21 reconstruct the non -- but I'd be surprised.

22 Because usually the biologic data 
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1 you have is, you know, gross alpha for uranium 

2 or you'd have a milligrams or micrograms per 

3 liter that you would use for the uranium. But 

4 the non-uranium isotopes you usually would have 

5 a problem.

6 You know we'd have to look at it. 

7 But I would agree that if it's the non-uranium 

8 isotopes, it's usually difficult to 

9 reconstruct those doses.

10 MR. FARVER: It looks like there 

11 were some whole body counts and chest counts.

12 DR. MAURO: Oh, okay. Okay.

13 MR. FARVER: Which that goes back 

14 to the NIOSH response that you could not put 

15 a -- it was not bound and there was not a 

16 bounding scenario.

17 DR. MAURO: Okay.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Let us go on.

19 MR. FARVER: Okay. Case 258. 

20 258.1. Another Allied Chemical case.

21 The first finding is NIOSH did not 

22 account for all missed photon dose. And let's 
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1 see if I can get a little bit more info. It is 

2 this -- missed photon dose.

3 We found dosimetry records 

4 contained the summary of the quarterly photon 

5 readings for all years as well as monthly 

6 readings for all years except 1967. There did 

7 not appear to be any readings in 1976 and the 

8 first three months of 1980.

9 NIOSH did not assign missed dose for 

10 those months. And it would have been 

11 claimant-favorable to assign missed dose for 

12 those periods since the worker was consistently 

13 monitored for external and internal.

14 Okay. In their response they 

15 say -- there are reports that ‘67 probably 

16 should be ‘69. Quarterly; no monthly.

17 MR. SIEBERT: I can talk you 

18 through this, Doug, save you a little bit of 

19 trouble.

20 MR. FARVER: Thank you.

21 MR. SIEBERT: No problem. We 

22 agree that there was only monthly cycle data 
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1 available at the time. But looking at the 

2 surrounding years, it's reasonable to assume 

3 that monthly exchange cycles were actually 

4 occurring.

5 So we've updated the DR guidance. 

6 We agree that monthly is reasonable in this 

7 case. We've updated the DR guidance to reflect 

8 that monthly exchanges would be appropriate 

9 during that time frame.

10 And I believe that is also being 

11 integrated into the new Site Profile to clarify 

12 that.

13 MR. FARVER: Okay.

14 DR. MAURO: I have a question, if 

15 you could just help me out a bit, so you're 

16 agreeing that not enough missed dose was 

17 assigned to this worker? Done with the 

18 monthly, presumed monthly, change out.

19 MR. SIEBERT: Right. Well what 

20 we're saying is the TBD as it was written 

21 previously didn't address this situation. 

22 Further digging, it's reasonable that 
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1 monthly -- the actual records give us quarterly 

2 values. But with a little bit more digging, 

3 it's reasonable to assume that monthly badging 

4 was actually going on at that time.

5 So we've updated the guidance to 

6 reflect that. And we're agreeing that that 

7 would have been a reasonable assumption in this 

8 case.

9 DR. MAURO: So what did we do by way 

10 of process? What you're saying is if you were 

11 to do that particular dose reconstruction 

12 today, you probably would have assigned this 

13 dose on a monthly change-out basis.

14 That being the case, by way of 

15 issues resolution and dealing with this 

16 particular claimant where you say: Well, if we 

17 were to do it today, we'd probably do it a little 

18 differently. What do you do in a circumstance 

19 like that?

20 MR. SIEBERT: Right. And once the 

21 Technical Basis Document, actually it's the 

22 Site Profile, is updated and approved, then it 
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1 will go into the PER process and this person 

2 would be reconsidered under new guidance.

3 DR. MAURO: The only thing I have to 

4 say about that: When is a reason to think that 

5 maybe this would be a reversal? Sometimes when 

6 we do our reviews is very rare, but we do it, 

7 we have a finding that [we] say gee, I think this 

8 one is a real one and it looks like a reversal.

9 What we typically do, and we took 

10 this guidance from TBD, is we would immediately 

11 inform you folks so that you could look at it. 

12 Because normally you don't want to wait too long 

13 to act on one that might really be a reversal.

14 So the only thing I would ask is that 

15 since this one, you might think that it should 

16 be redone, and maybe will be redone as part of 

17 a PER. Is there any reason to believe that the 

18 magnitude of the dose was changed to such an 

19 extent that you could actually get a reversal?

20 MR. CALHOUN: John, this is Grady. 

21 And this is about the third or fourth one of 

22 these we've come up with in the last two days.
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1 And yes, we are, we do do that. 

2 We've taken these few cases, and we'll do a more 

3 close review of it.

4 However, we've got to do the dose 

5 reconstruction to an approved document. So 

6 we've got to wait until the document is approved 

7 before we do -- that's what drives the PER.

8 DR. MAURO: Oh, I understand what 

9 you're saying. But you know, there's the other 

10 side. The other tension to the problem is if 

11 there's good reason to believe you've got a 

12 reversal, this is a policy that you folks have 

13 to -- you know if there originally was a 

14 reversal, I think you got to jump on that right 

15 away.

16 MR. CALHOUN: And we absolutely 

17 would do that if an approved document caused 

18 that reversal.

19 DR. MAURO: And you wouldn't do it 

20 now?

21 MR. CALHOUN: Not with it --

22 DR. MAURO: Notwithstanding the 
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1 fact that the approval process is in the mill, 

2 but you know where it's going. And you know 

3 that you --

4 MR. CALHOUN: We don't know where 

5 it's going on all the cases. Because a lot of 

6 times these documents are hung up in committees 

7 just like this. There’s not a lot of back and 

8 forth until we get concurrence from you guys.

9 But a lot of times they’re not in 

10 that. A lot of times they're just between us 

11 and ORAU and between ourselves.

12 So I don't know where this one is 

13 specifically. If this is Allied, it looks like 

14 it's ready to be approved in June of this year. 

15 But certainly we can go back and look and see 

16 if we think that it's pretty concrete. And we 

17 can go back and take a look at it.

18 But we can't reverse it until we've 

19 got an approved document.

20 DR. MAURO: By the way, do we have 

21 a case here that looks like it might be reversed 

22 on this basis?
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1 MR. FARVER: This is Doug. No.

2 DR. MAURO: No. Okay, that's all I 

3 wanted to know. We know when they're going to 

4 be reversed, I mean, if you agree with the 

5 comment. And this sounds like it's not one.

6 I would say this again, poking my 

7 nose into your business here, but I think it's 

8 very important that the Board weigh in on this 

9 particular matter.

10 When SC&A on that rare occasion 

11 says, gee I think we've got a reversal here. I 

12 don't think you put that in the queue waiting 

13 for the PER to be issued, waiting for the Work 

14 Group to get to [it] -- even to get to this point 

15 where you are now -- waiting for it to come into 

16 the attention. Because you know we're on what, 

17 set number 19. And right now I guess you're 

18 reviewing 10.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: 10 to 15. 

20 This happens to be the 12th set.

21 DR. MAURO: Oh, we're up to -- oh, 

22 congratulations. That's great.
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1 What I'm saying is when, even like 

2 today, if we were doing this DR review and we 

3 saw something and say gee, I think this might 

4 be a reversal. It's my understanding, and Ted 

5 please help me out here, that we immediately 

6 inform Ted, the Work Group, --

7 MR. KATZ: Right.

8 DR. MAURO: And I think NIOSH, that 

9 we got something here that we think you should 

10 look at as soon as possible.

11 MR. CALHOUN: And we've done that 

12 and there's one that really -- that really could 

13 slip. And I don't know if we'll go over it 

14 today, I don't think we will.

15 But it's the only one I know of 

16 actually. But anyway, we've already requested 

17 a return from DOL on that one because it was 

18 based on a document that was approved.

19 I got to keep going back to a 

20 document that was approved. Because if we 

21 think something might flip because of something 

22 that we might do -- you certainly can't be 
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1 advocating that we complete an official dose 

2 reconstruction based on a document that doesn't 

3 exist.

4 DR. MAURO: Well, I mean I --

5 MR. CALHOUN: And it's contrary to 

6 existing documents.

7 DR. MAURO: To me, you see this idea 

8 that there has to be this document behind it, 

9 no, there's good science that's behind it. And 

10 then as a you know, do you decide to -- I can't 

11 see a guy waiting here for a year or two or three 

12 to resolve some document that's about to go 

13 through a PER process. And meanwhile he's 

14 waiting on his compensation decision.

15 In this case, Doug, I believe that 

16 obviously, and I know you know you're judgment 

17 is this is not a reversal. So it's okay to put 

18 it into the queue. We know it's not going to 

19 be reversed.

20 MR. CALHOUN: But we depend, and 

21 let's not lose [sight of] the fact that we do 

22 look at those very closely.
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1 DR. MAURO: Okay, okay.

2 DR. H. BEHLING: This is Hans 

3 Behling. I need to jump in here because you're 

4 touching on something that's very, very 

5 important to me on the case. And if I may, I'll 

6 take a couple of minutes.

7 Because this was the case that was 

8 supposed to be potentially reviewed sometime 

9 today, but I know we're not going to get there. 

10 But based on the fact that you touched on this 

11 very issue, John, I feel I need to at least make 

12 a comment here.

13 And if I may, I will give you some 

14 of the details about a case that is several 

15 years old. And it involves a dose 

16 reconstruction involving a person who was part 

17 of the PPG, the Pacific Proving Ground. And 

18 that particular claim was adjudicated back in 

19 2011.

20 I reviewed the case and was doing a 

21 one on one with the Board Member and I can even 

22 tell you who that Board Member was. He thought 
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1 that this was important enough to bring it 

2 immediately to the attention of NIOSH and have 

3 it looked at again. Because the evidence that 

4 I provided on behalf of that case, and [it] was 

5 compelling and it would have been obviously --

6 could be compensated.

7 I never heard another word about it. 

8 And this case is coming up again here as a part 

9 of the 14th case set. And one of the things 

10 that has happened was that it was based on a Site 

11 Profile for the PPG, which I only recently 

12 reviewed in 2013. And I came up with an awful 

13 lot of problems associated with the PPG Site 

14 Profile.

15 And my recommendation now is to once 

16 again postpone the review of this particular 

17 dose reconstruction. Because most of the 

18 problems identified on behalf of this dose 

19 reconstruction are really problems I 

20 identified in behalf of the issues that involve 

21 the Site Profile for PPG.

22 And we've discussed it before. I 
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1 think Wanda Munn was going to pursue an approach 

2 that we would set up a committee so that we'd 

3 look at the PPG Site Profile. And once again, 

4 this case has been on hold now since 2011.

5 And again, depending on how soon 

6 that particular committee will be appointed, 

7 how long it will take to review the Site 

8 Profile, this case will probably be on the 

9 sidelines for five years. And I have very 

10 little doubt that this case will be turned over 

11 because of the serious findings that I 

12 identified on behalf of not only this case, but 

13 the Site Profile on which it was based.

14 DR. MAURO: What we have here is, I 

15 think, a question that we will immediately 

16 report back when we see something that might be 

17 a problem when that occurs as Hans just pointed 

18 out. And there were two cases in the last round 

19 of reviews that we did that we did do that.

20 We sent an email out alerting the 

21 folks, you folks, that we think we have a couple 

22 of reversals here. And that was -- that's our 
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1 ground rules now that we follow.

2 But it sounds like that once it 

3 makes it to that point, we're not quite sure 

4 what happens to it. Is it acted on 

5 immediately? Or is it put, you know, into the 

6 basket and waiting until let's say other 

7 documents.

8 And this [is] really none of our 

9 business. Believe me, I feel as if I'm trying 

10 to speak to you, you know, a little out of turn 

11 here. But it sounds to me that this is 

12 something that needs to be talked about a little 

13 bit more.

14 MR. KATZ: Now John, I mean, let me 

15 explain. Because I think Grady tried to 

16 explain.

17 But yes, you said for example the 

18 two cases you provided to me to NIOSH, just as 

19 you were saying. And Grady responded in part, 

20 one of those cases may be a flip.

21 And they're acting on it in due 

22 course, because the problems with that case 
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1 were related to procedures that are in place. 

2 So they can fix that right away.

3 So if you follow the logic of that, 

4 if that turns out to be all as I just said, they 

5 will redo that dose reconstruction because they 

6 have the procedures to redo it. And if it 

7 flips, that person will get compensated and 

8 that will all be done --

9 DR. MAURO: Quickly.

10 MR. KATZ: In haste, right. Just 

11 as -- just as you envisioned.

12 The other situation you have, is you 

13 have cases where the procedures themselves, the 

14 current procedures do not support a change 

15 necessarily. But you have a concern, or 

16 someone has a concern, that the procedures 

17 aren't right. And they're causing a wrong 

18 outcome for the cases.

19 And it's not going to be just one 

20 case then because the procedures are for the 

21 whole site or what have you.

22 DR. H. BEHLING: And Ted, this is 
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1 Hans again. The issue here is complicated by 

2 the very fact that the particular PPG 

3 individual's dose reconstruction was based on 

4 the Site Profile which we never reviewed. This 

5 Site Profile --

6 MR. KATZ: I understand. So I'm 

7 just, because I really don't want to hijack this 

8 whole meeting with this, because this is really 

9 kind of detrimental to trying to just get 

10 through the cases we're trying to get through.

11 But so, what I'm saying anyway, is 

12 where the procedures themselves are 

13 potentially the problem, because SC&A or I 

14 guess it's generally it would be SC&A or a Board 

15 views that there may be issues with the 

16 procedures, that those procedures have to be 

17 resolved first.

18 They can't crank out a new dose 

19 reconstruction until they've resolved that 

20 indeed NIOSH agrees the procedures need to be 

21 changed. And they have to go through their 

22 process to change their procedure.
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1 So they can't just crank out a dose 

2 reconstruction before they've resolved all the 

3 issues related to that procedure. And that's 

4 just a, you know, sorry fact of the matter.

5 And it may be that SC&A's absolutely 

6 accurate, and the procedure needs fixing. But 

7 until it’s been resolved, you know, you can't 

8 get to the answer there. And that case does 

9 have to sit.

10 DR. H. BEHLING: Well, as I said, I 

11 was hoping that we had talked about it before. 

12 And I believe Wanda had taken on this to 

13 herself.

14 MR. KATZ: Hans please. So I know 

15 that we've had this discussion in Procedures. 

16 We've actually -- it came up at the Board 

17 teleconference too. And we can carry on this 

18 discussion further outside the bounds of this 

19 Subcommittee meeting. But we're really 

20 hijacking this meeting by, you know --

21 DR. MAURO: Fair enough, fair 

22 enough, Ted. I understand.
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1 MR. CALHOUN: Can we just end the 

2 conversation though with somebody sending me 

3 that case number?

4 DR. H. BEHLING: Okay.

5 MR. CALHOUN: The claim, because I 

6 got the two other ones. But I don't have that 

7 one off the top of my head. So send me that one 

8 and I'll make sure it gets looked at.

9 MR. KATZ: Okay, Hans.

10 DR. H. BEHLING: Okay.

11 MR. KATZ: Yeah, Hans will send it. 

12 Go ahead and send it to me, Hans, so I have a 

13 record too of it.

14 DR. H. BEHLING: Okay.

15 MR. KATZ: Thank you.

16 MEMBER MUNN: Thank you folks.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

18 Let's go on.

19 MR. FARVER: Okay. I just want to 

20 mention one thing to Grady. This has to do with 

21 Tab 250 from yesterday. This is the case that 

22 had the MAP air, about months. Seven months 
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1 versus 7.9 months.

2 And it really has nothing to do with 

3 changing procedures. But that MAP air 

4 correction, we'll bump it up about 13 percent. 

5 And we'll likely change the PoC and reverse the 

6 case.

7 MR. CALHOUN: Yeah, I don't know, 

8 I'm lost here. What are you talking about? Is 

9 this something that we've done?

10 MR. FARVER: The case from 

11 yesterday, a Y-12 case.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: This was 

13 from yesterday you were saying -- you said 

14 earlier you were going to see if you could look 

15 into it today.

16 MR. CALHOUN: Oh, okay.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: You earlier 

18 today said it's not going to be possible.

19 MR. CALHOUN: The B data, is that 

20 the case?

21 MR. FARVER: No, no. This has to 

22 do strictly with --
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No, the .49 

2 years versus months. Six months versus .49 

3 years.

4 MR. CALHOUN: I'm too old, I 

5 forgot.

6 MR. SIEBERT: This is Scott. Let 

7 me jump in. Grady did yesterday task us to look 

8 at that one specifically.

9 The dose reconstruction, we're 

10 doing it on our side and reviewing it along with 

11 all the present day changes in documentation as 

12 well. And we will get that answer over to Grady 

13 as soon as we can.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Great. But 

15 let's go on folks. We basically -- we're --

16 MR. FARVER: Okay, I just wanted to 

17 say something to you about a little change.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: This is 

19 moving all around now at this point. And we 

20 need to move ahead. Even though I understand 

21 these are important issues, but --

22 MR. FARVER: Okay. 258.2.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

2 MR. FARVER: Okay. NIOSH did not 

3 address the possibility that the worker was 

4 exposed to enriched uranium and this was based 

5 on something in the CATI report, I believe.

6 And I'll -- this is one of these 

7 issues where it would have been nice if they 

8 would have put a statement in there 

9 acknowledging it. And NIOSH agreed it would 

10 have been nice to acknowledge that, okay.

11 So there's no real action to it.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah.

13 MR. FARVER: So our action is we all 

14 agree it would have been nice to include a 

15 statement in there. But --

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, it's 

17 hard to think of that as a finding as opposed 

18 to an observation. But --

19 MR. FARVER: Well I suggest closing 

20 it because there's really no more action to it.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 

22 Okay, let's close. Observation 1?
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1 MR. FARVER: Observation 1, the 

2 report should address the potential exposures 

3 associated with direct deposition of airborne 

4 particles on skin. You know potential skin 

5 contamination.

6 NIOSH agrees that according to the 

7 Site Profile, conditions existed at Allied 

8 Chemicals that might result in skin 

9 contamination. And they're looking in to see 

10 if more incidents of skin contamination reports 

11 are available, but there is no -- there was no 

12 answer at the end of January.

13 MR. SIEBERT: And this is Scott. 

14 Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this is 

15 the general issue, that's an overarching issue 

16 with the Procedural Subcommittee. I mean 

17 Wanda can --

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That's 

19 correct.

20 MR. CALHOUN: That's definitely 

21 correct.

22 MR. FARVER: And that's probably 
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1 why it was just made an observation and not a 

2 finding.

3 MR. CALHOUN: Right. And my guess 

4 is that we're not going to get into the business 

5 of making up skin contaminations.

6 MR. FARVER: No.

7 DR. MAURO: This issue has been 

8 resolved. And it's all -- it's under the 

9 Procedures Subcommittee. All matters related 

10 to -- we're calling this localized skin 

11 contamination issue. How they're going to be 

12 dealt with was addressed and resolved at the 

13 last -- I believe the last or the one before --

14 Procedures Subcommittee.

15 So there is, and I think that is 

16 whatever you're doing here on this particular 

17 case, if it's in accord with that agreed-upon 

18 protocol, you know, I think you're fine. But 

19 if there is a need to do something different in 

20 light of this most recent agreement on how this 

21 is all going to be done, you know, it may need 

22 to be revisited.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No. This 

2 is -- this is an observation. It is in 

3 progress. It is something that the Procedures 

4 Committee is dealing with, or has dealt with.

5 DR. MAURO: I think it has -- is 

6 Wanda on the line?

7 MEMBER MUNN: Yes I am.

8 DR. MAURO: Wanda, am I 

9 misrepresenting this about? I think that's 

10 resolved.

11 MEMBER MUNN: No, it was. My 

12 recollection is that we resolved it, yes. I 

13 don't think we have any outstanding issues with 

14 respect to skin contamination.

15 DR. MAURO: Right.

16 MEMBER MUNN: I'd have to go back 

17 and check the minutes myself. But I do believe 

18 that's the case. I think we've put that to bed.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes. Okay. 

20 I think it's just a matter of it hasn't gotten 

21 reported back to the committee except now 

22 verbally.
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1 So, alright, let's go ahead. 

2 There's not an issue it's being -- it's been 

3 dealt with.

4 The second observation?

5 MR. FARVER: The second 

6 observation is that NIOSH should correct the 

7 description of the DR methodology as provided 

8 in the DR report to reflect the assumptions that 

9 were actually employed. And I believe this has 

10 to do with the attenuation rate of surface 

11 contamination. I will go find it.

12 MR. SIEBERT: That is correct,

13 Doug. It's the OTIB-70.

14 MR. FARVER: But that issue's 

15 already been resolved, correct?

16 MR. SIEBERT: Correct. And 

17 OTIB-70 is being folded into -- the process of 

18 OTIB-70 is being folded into the Site Profile 

19 version that we are working on right now. So 

20 that will resolve that.

21 MR. FARVER: And if there is a 

22 change in anything we'll go back and look at 
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1 this case.

2 MR. SIEBERT: That is correct. If 

3 there's an increase in dose, that is correct.

4 MR. FARVER: Okay.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright.

6 MR. FARVER: Observation 3. NIOSH 

7 should consider assigning some fraction on 

8 intakes where radionuclides other than uranium 

9 for the AWE residual period. And this is an SEC 

10 issue, so it goes back to -- we can't really do 

11 it.

12 Observation 4. In general many of 

13 the assumptions described in the Site Profile 

14 for modeling the rate of decline of internal 

15 exposures during the residual period are 

16 questionable. There's been some changes from 

17 OTIB-70 from Rev 1 to Rev 2 and incorporated 

18 into the Site Profile.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: We can't see 

20 the Observation 4. Could we scroll that? 

21 Thank you.

22 MR. FARVER: Has the Site Profile 
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1 been updated Scott, and issued?

2 MR. SIEBERT: That's the one we've 

3 been talking about. It's presently in 

4 resolution.

5 MR. FARVER: It's in process?

6 MR. SIEBERT: Correct.

7 MR. FARVER: So the changes in 

8 depletion rate will be incorporated into Rev 2 

9 of the Site Profile.

10 MR. SIEBERT: Yes, that's a better 

11 way of saying it. I'm sorry, when I wrote this 

12 we have incorporated it into what is going to 

13 be Rev 2, so you're right.

14 MR. FARVER: Okay.

15 MR. SIEBERT: Thank you.

16 MR. FARVER: And once again, this 

17 is just an observation.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

19 MEMBER MUNN: So no action then.

20 MR. FARVER: No action.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Next.

22 MR. FARVER: Next we jump to Ames 
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1 Laboratory.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Ames, so 

3 that means we finished Allied?

4 MR. FARVER: Yes, we've finished 

5 with Allied.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

7 Good.

8 MR. FARVER: 306. 306.1. Okay 

9 the finding is NIOSH failed to apply correction 

10 factor of two to the missed neutron dose.

11 And this case -- it goes back to 

12 table 6.1 of the Technical Basis Document and 

13 the footnote at the bottom that says for years 

14 of NTA film use between ‘54 and ‘79, the 

15 adjusted neutron dose is calculated using the 

16 correction factor of two. And that's what 

17 prompted the finding.

18 If you go all the way to the very 

19 bottom of this matrix on page 74, so I 

20 reproduced table 6.1 and the footnotes. And I 

21 believe it's footnote D that talks about this. 

22 And I don't think there's any, you know, 
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1 anyone's going to dispute that footnote exists. 

2 It's a matter of: Is it applicable?

3 MR. SMITH: Yeah, this is Matt 

4 Smith with the ORAU team. And I looked at this 

5 with the DR. The DR pointed out that 

6 throughout the TBD, that throughout the Site 

7 Profile, including the table that discusses the 

8 MDLs for neutrons, there's no provision put 

9 forward to apply a correction factor to missed 

10 dose.

11 And certainly seeing the other 

12 claims that we looked at, that's not a common 

13 approach. It seems to me that again, some of 

14 like many of the other things that we've run 

15 into today, it's a matter of a TBD that needs 

16 to be clarified on this issue.

17 There's a flow chart that indicates 

18 how the process for dose measured in this, in 

19 addition to the table, I don't have the table 

20 number off the top of my head. But the specific 

21 one that addresses MDLs for neutrons and the 

22 factor of two is not discussed in any of those 
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1 other areas of the Site Profile.

2 MR. FARVER: No, it just shows up at 

3 the bottom of the table 6-1. I understand. Is 

4 there a DR guidance document on this site?

5 MR. SMITH: That I do not know off 

6 the top of my head. And Scott --

7 MR. SIEBERT: Give me a second, I'm 

8 checking on that one.

9 MR. FARVER: Okay. I'm just 

10 trying to look for an easy way to correct this 

11 so that it doesn't happen again. It's just a 

12 little confusing.

13 MR. SMITH: Probably the most 

14 effective correction would be to page change to 

15 that table.

16 MR. FARVER: Okay. All right, how 

17 easy is that to do?

18 MR. SIEBERT: At this point it's 

19 not in the DR guidance. I thought I had ensured 

20 that it was. I will ensure that the DR guidance 

21 is updated within, you know, the next couple of 

22 days. And once the TBD -- when the TBD is next 
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1 revised, that will go in there.

2 MR. FARVER: So there is a DR 

3 guidance document for Ames Lab?

4 MR. SIEBERT: There is a DR 

5 guidance document and I'm looking at it right 

6 now.

7 MR. FARVER: Okay.

8 MR. SIEBERT: And it doesn't 

9 discuss this specific issue. So I will ensure 

10 that it does.

11 MR. FARVER: But we've got some 

12 clarification to the DR guidance document, 

13 correct?

14 MR. SIEBERT: Yep.

15 MR. FARVER: That will work.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

17 Let's go back to 306.

18 MR. FARVER: Okay. 306.2. NIOSH 

19 failed to use the employee sealing records and 

20 TBD for sound --

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: 306.1, 

22 right, we just, pardon me, we just closed.
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1 MR. FARVER: We just closed that.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yeah, okay.

3 MR. FARVER: We modified the 

4 guidance document.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, .2,

6 sorry.

7 MR. FARVER: 306.2 failed to use 

8 DOE records seal, the employees records and TBD 

9 for assigning frequency of x-ray exams. Looks 

10 like there was an error in the workbook 

11 algorithm, I believe.

12 MR. SIEBERT: Yeah, Doug, you are 

13 correct. It's a -- we've looked at the tool 

14 itself, and it had a mis-coding that it would 

15 skip a line. And it missed -- it would adjust 

16 the x-rays to the wrong line, to the wrong year, 

17 making a test during that time frame.

18 I have looked back -- because your 

19 additional question is how many other similar 

20 workbooks contain the same kind of 

21 question -- same kind of error, which was 

22 obviously a huge question for me too. We've 
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1 looked back at some of the other tools.

2 This being the Ames tool, is one of 

3 the -- how can I say this, it's one of the 

4 end-product old method. Yes, SM tool, those 

5 are some of the main tools that we used to start 

6 creating tools for sites when we're starting to 

7 grade it.

8 Ames was developed from one of 

9 those. I can't tell you which. But I've 

10 looked back to the originals of those, and it 

11 did not have the same issues. So it was 

12 introduced when we created or some time in the 

13 Ames pool itself.

14 But we're looking at if that has 

15 been addressed and changed -- let me see. Oh, 

16 I'm sorry, yes. It was resolved in the 2010 

17 version that next came out of the tool itself.

18 So the Ames tool was fixed and we 

19 looked to see if other tools were affected. 

20 And it did appear that there were other -- there 

21 appeared to be no other tools affected.

22 MR. FARVER: Okay.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

2 So -- and how many were affected at Ames?

3 MR. FARVER: How many cases? Any 

4 idea?

5 MR. SIEBERT: I can't tell you 

6 that. If you recall --

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I don't know 

8 the facility. I'm not --

9 MEMBER MUNN: It won't be -- it 

10 won't be large because there weren't that many 

11 claims.

12 MR. SIEBERT: Ames is a relatively 

13 small number of claims -- of sites in the 

14 claims. But we are -- this is the bigger issue 

15 that we discussed on looking at changes in tools 

16 over time.

17 I know we talked about this with 

18 Hanford yesterday. We are going back and 

19 working through the changes to the tools over 

20 time and ensuring that we look at basically a 

21 tool PER over time to ensure those that are 

22 impacted on those kind of changes are 
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1 reassessed.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. And 

3 that this is being worked on and it seems to me 

4 we can -- from our end -- we can close it.

5 MR. FARVER: Okay.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, .2 

7 closed.

8 MR. FARVER: We just note that as 

9 another QA concern.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh yes.

11 MR. FARVER: Okay. 306.3, NIOSH 

12 applied the uncertainty factor of 1.3 for both 

13 the dose value and the distribution for best 

14 estimate. It looks like the dose 

15 reconstructor manually changed the

16 distribution and the uncertainty.

17 MR. SIEBERT: Yes. I think 

18 [that’s] what they were doing, and I'll agree 

19 this is a dose reconstruction error. What the 

20 dose reconstructor was doing was modifying it 

21 to be a best estimate. However they forgot to 

22 remove the 1.3 factor before they applied the 
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1 30 percent as a normal.

2 So it's overestimated the way it is, 

3 but not intentionally. And I'll just point 

4 out, that I know we have discussed this before. 

5 But we no longer use a 1.3 factor. We use 

6 actual x-rays when we have them, and all of our 

7 x-rays are best estimate at this point.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

9 MR. FARVER: Okay.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, we can 

11 go on, close.

12 MR. FARVER: 306.4, NIOSH used 

13 inhalation [instead of] standard ingestion in 

14 the CADW for zinc-65. In other words when they 

15 went to input into the CADW they clicked on the 

16 wrong tab and used inhalation instead of 

17 ingestion.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

19 MR. FARVER: So this would be 

20 another error of the dose reconstructor, not a 

21 workbook error or anything.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That looks 
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1 correct. And it's been picked up and noted. I 

2 think we can go on.

3 MR. FARVER: Okay. 306.5. The 

4 environmental intakes provided in Table 4.7 

5 were not addressed. The environmental intakes 

6 in the Site Profile document were calculated 

7 using overestimating assumptions. The DR is 

8 advised to apply them as a constant because of 

9 this.

10 As a best estimate case, these 

11 overestimating doses were not applied. NIOSH 

12 agrees this issue should have been discussed in 

13 the report. Additionally, NIOSH has clarified 

14 that these intakes are to be assigned in best 

15 estimate claims until further review of the TBD 

16 determines if more appropriate values should be 

17 used in best estimate situations.

18 And that has been included in the DR 

19 guidance document. But anyway we just wanted 

20 to note that we didn't find anything in the 

21 technical basis directing the dose 

22 reconstructor not to include those 
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1 environmental intakes.

2 MR. SIEBERT: Yes, this is Scott. 

3 We agree that that is not well written in the 

4 TBD. And it leaves an open question for the DR 

5 that in this case they interpreted it 

6 incorrectly.

7 Even though what the DR was thinking 

8 in this process, because I did talk to them, is 

9 the values in the TBD are clearly stated to be 

10 overestimates and we do not assign 

11 overestimates in best estimate cases as a 

12 general rule.

13 However in a case like this when 

14 they are environmental and it's all we have, we 

15 actually should be assigning these because it's 

16 not that large of an overestimate based on the 

17 fact that it's environmental.

18 So we have clarified that with dose 

19 reconstructors. We have clarified that as I 

20 said in the Ames DR document. And that's the 

21 document that I was just looking [at] to see if 

22 the previous issue was in there. And this 
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1 issue is in there; I verified that.

2 MR. FARVER: Okay.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright. 

4 Let's continue.

5 MR. FARVER: 307. There's just 

6 one observation that has to do with the medical 

7 doses. Okay, it would have been 

8 claimant-favorable and consistent with the few 

9 available medical records to use the frequency 

10 in Table 3.1 and assign x-ray doses on a 

11 semi-annual frequency for each year.

12 It looks like they were assigned 

13 based on actual records. 

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

15 MR. FARVER: And in current 

16 guidance, she wasn’t assign any dose on some 

17 x-rays because they were done off site.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

19 Maybe we can take one more case.

20 MR. FARVER: One more case. 243. 

21 INEL, I think. There it is.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes, it is.
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1 MR. FARVER: Okay. I'm slowing 

2 down a little bit, I'm just not as feisty in the 

3 afternoon.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

5 MR. FARVER: Okay. The CATI 

6 report. Finding 243.1 The DR report does not 

7 address CATI information regarding a 

8 radiological descriptions. CATI employee 

9 reports that he was restricted from routine job 

10 duties due to high radiation doses.

11 Testing processing samples when he 

12 was in hot cell areas occurred a couple of dozen 

13 times. And we think it would have been nice to 

14 put something in the report, or maybe compare 

15 the employee's dosimeter to the pocket ion 

16 chamber readings.

17 MR. SIEBERT: Yes, and Doug we 

18 agree that putting a comment in the report would 

19 have been a good idea for this one.

20 MR. FARVER: Do you ever go to the 

21 extent of checking for something like this, 

22 comparing the dosimeters to the PIC readings?
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1 MR. SIEBERT: This is INEL.

2 Honestly that's a depth that I don't know 

3 specifically at INEL whether that's the case. 

4 I don't believe we generally do because the TLD 

5 or the dosimeter is the dose of record in 

6 most -- well not in most cases. The PIC is just 

7 used for control purposes.

8 But I can't state specifically for 

9 INEL, but I believe it's generally not going to 

10 be the case. And Matt Smith, by all means if 

11 you have something to add on that, please bail 

12 me out.

13 MR. SMITH: Sure, we're not, 

14 because of the unreliability of the PICs, we 

15 wouldn't make that comparison. But when a 

16 comparison is made, we would do that against the 

17 dose limits at the time.

18 MR. FARVER: Okay.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright.

20 MR. FARVER: I'm not saying you 

21 should do it, I'm just thinking that -- I 

22 believe in this case the PIC data was available. 
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1 It was in the records.

2 And I'm thinking that if I've got it 

3 then I've got the dosimeter reading there, I 

4 might take a look at them around the same time 

5 period just to see if there's anything strange.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Was this an 

7 observation? I don't see it on the screen. Or 

8 was this a finding?

9 MR. FARVER: A finding.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: This is a 

11 finding.

12 MR. FARVER: Basically the finding 

13 was that they did not address --

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

15 MR. FARVER: The CATI information.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

17 MR. FARVER: I'm just saying that I 

18 would -- you know if it were me -- I would 

19 probably look at it and since it was available, 

20 I would look at it. I'm not saying I would even 

21 write anything up on it.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes. Okay. 
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1 I think this is closable. Is there any 

2 disagreement?

3 Let's go down, were there some 

4 observations of those?

5 And I'm keeping an eye on the time, 

6 folks. This has to be finished by 4:30 at the 

7 latest. So --

8 MR. FARVER: Okay. 243, 

9 observation 1. The dose reconstructor made 

10 several choices based on the monitoring record 

11 that were not justified in this case, assuming 

12 that the intake would only occur during periods 

13 when the employee was monitored by bioassay.

14 It cannot necessarily be verified 

15 in the record that the recorded is complete or 

16 consistent with job assignments and cannot 

17 demonstrate that adequate claimant-favorable 

18 constants have been applied.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. And 

20 NIOSH appropriately comments. And if the SC&A 

21 accepts, you should go on to the next.

22 MR. FARVER: Probably this is where 
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1 NIOSH says that PER 17 was not applicable to 

2 this claim.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

4 MR. FARVER: I don't know enough 

5 about the PERs to make a statement on that. But 

6 I mean it is just an observation. We're just 

7 kind of pointing that out.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes. 

9 Alright.

10 MR. FARVER: And that will wrap up 

11 that case.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Good. 

13 Let's see. We have another one, 290. Let me 

14 ask folks right now, can we do another case? We 

15 can start another case now.

16 We do eventually have to think about 

17 time for another meeting. And I don't want 

18 to -- I didn't want to go up against our time 

19 limit and not have that resolved.

20 MR. SIEBERT: Dr. Kotelchuck, this 

21 is Scott. I apologize for butting in, but 

22 another thing that would be very helpful for I 
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1 know NIOSH is, since we're getting into -- we're 

2 getting finished with the 10 to 13 sets, if we 

3 could have a brief discussion as to how we're 

4 going to be doing the 14 through 18.

5 Because if we make some decisions or 

6 at least have some guidance, then I could get 

7 started on getting some responses together.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That sounds 

9 like a good idea. So why don't we do the 

10 following: Let's talk about when our next 

11 meeting should be and then go on to that.

12 I'm having trouble with my machine. 

13 Hold it a second. It's been acting up this 

14 afternoon.

15 MEMBER MUNN: I can hardly hear 

16 you, David.

17 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, I'll 

18 speak a little louder. Thank you.

19 MEMBER MUNN: I don't know if it's 

20 my phone or whether -- you seem to be fading in 

21 and out.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, okay. 
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1 Well --

2 MR. KATZ: So this is Ted.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, Ted, 

4 what do you think of our time line?

5 MR. KATZ: Right. So we need time 

6 to publish a Federal Register notice and all 

7 that. And it seems to me that we want to meet 

8 as soon as we can, given that we have more to 

9 get done to be ready to report to the Secretary.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

11 MR. KATZ: So, you know, under 

12 those premises, I think the earliest we could 

13 meet given the Federal Register requirement, 

14 would be, let's see --

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: In May. In 

16 May.

17 MR. KATZ: Yes, it would definitely 

18 be in May. Beginning -- I think we could do it 

19 any time beginning about the 7th. May 7th 

20 forward, we could think about.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, let me 

22 ask the NIOSH folks if they believe they can 
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1 finish off some of the things -- some of the 

2 items that are outstanding from yesterday and 

3 today, if we are [meeting] by mid-May.

4 MEMBER MUNN: That’s really going 

5 to be key if NIOSH and our contractor can't 

6 devote a significant amount of time between now 

7 and then.

8 MR. KATZ: Well, there's very few 

9 items that are actually outstanding as I recall 

10 them at least.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. How 

12 much --

13 MR. KATZ: I understand there's a 

14 lot ahead of us still that's been prepared for 

15 this meeting --

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 

17 Roughly how many -- alright, well I certainly 

18 know the ones behind us. There are about a half 

19 a dozen to a dozen.

20 But what about forward? I'm still on 

21 the meeting screen, so I can't scroll through. 

22 Roughly how many cases do we have ahead of us?
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1 MR. KATZ: Doug?

2 MR. FARVER: I don't have them 

3 counted up, but we're on page 27 of 74.

4 MR. KATZ: Okay, a lot.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, a lot. 

6 And will those have been completed by mid-May?

7 MR. FARVER: Well, we already 

8 have -- each of us have provided responses.

9 MR. KATZ: Yes, those are all ready 

10 for the Subcommittee’s discussion.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay then, 

12 let's move it as quickly as we can then. Which 

13 is to say as early in May as we can.

14 MR. KATZ: Right. So I think 

15 that's what I was saying. So I think May 7 

16 forward is fine. I can get a Federal Register 

17 notice out in time to cover.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. We 

19 will have met in Augusta in late April, last 

20 week in April.

21 MR. KATZ: Right. April 29th 

22 we're in Augusta. So this is -- we're talking 
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1 about the following week basically.

2 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I would 

3 suggest that we not do it that week, but start 

4 looking at something like Monday the 12th.

5 MR. KATZ: Okay.

6 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Give people 

7 a little, not only rest, but time to get ready, 

8 prepare for the next round.

9 MR. KATZ: Yes.

10 MR. FARVER: This is Doug. I will 

11 be unavailable that week. But if someone wants 

12 to fill in, they're welcome to.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

14 MR. KATZ: But still I never get any 

15 issue of covering if Doug's not available.

16 MEMBER MUNN: And I'll be tied up 

17 until the 15th that week. After that I'm free 

18 the entire month.

19 MR. KATZ: And Wanda, are you 

20 saying tied up including the 15th, or up to?

21 MEMBER MUNN: The 15th, yes. Any 

22 time after the 15th.
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1 MR. KATZ: Okay, well that only 

2 leaves -- that Friday doesn't work. So that 

3 doesn't work for that week then.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That's not 

5 very good for us. How about, I will come back 

6 to either May 8th, Thursday May 8th?

7 MR. KATZ: Yes, how about that?

8 MEMBER MUNN: I'm out the 8th and 

9 9th. 

10 MEMBER CLAWSON: That isn't good 

11 for me.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And that's 

13 no good for you, okay.

14 MR. KATZ: How about the 7th?

15 MR. CALHOUN: I'm out the 7th. I'm 

16 out the 6th and 7th.

17 MR. KATZ: We're on to the week of 

18 the 19th.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: We are and so 

20 we're going to be later, and I thought some 

21 folks said they might be available late in the 

22 week of the 12th, like the 15th or 16th, 
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1 Thursday or Friday.

2 MR. KATZ: Well, the 16th doesn't 

3 work for me. So that week is out. It's the 

4 week of the 19th.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay. 

6 There it is.

7 MR. KATZ: So how are people during 

8 that week?

9 MEMBER MUNN: I'm open.

10 MR. CALHOUN: This is Grady, I'm 

11 open.

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I'm open.

13 MR. FARVER: I suggest Tuesday the 

14 20th.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I am tied up 

16 that day. I have an obligation. How about 

17 Wednesday?

18 MR. FARVER: That would work also.

19 MR. KATZ: Okay, and Mark, are you 

20 on the line?

21 MEMBER GRIFFON: Yes, yes.

22 MR. KATZ: How about the 21st for 
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1 you? Wednesday, the 21st of May?

2 MEMBER GRIFFON: Wednesday, the 

3 21st of May should work, yes.

4 MR. KATZ: Okay. And Brad?

5 MEMBER CLAWSON: I'm looking right 

6 now. The way it looks, it should be good for 

7 me.

8 MR. KATZ: Okay.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Good. I 

10 think that's -- and should we start -- we'll 

11 start at 9:30?

12 MR. KATZ: Right. So let's put 

13 that in. I'm going to have to shoot out a note 

14 to David and John Poston.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

16 MR. KATZ: Because otherwise we're 

17 relying on all of you to be available.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. But 

19 it will only be one day this time, folks.

20 MR. KATZ: No, absolutely. 

21 Absolutely.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: You can 
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1 hopefully schedule around it.

2 MR. KATZ: And I think 10:30 seems 

3 to me a pretty good starting time because it 

4 gets pretty tiring.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Oh, I'm 

6 sorry, I said 9:30 and I meant 10:30.

7 MR. KATZ: Yes.

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

9 MEMBER MUNN: I was going to make a 

10 rude comment about that, too.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright, 

12 okay. Sorry.

13 MR. KATZ: Okay, so we're on for 

14 10:30 on the 21st unless it's bad for both 

15 Poston and Richardson.

16 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. 

17 What's our fallback? Would a fallback for 

18 Thursday work?

19 MR. KATZ: And that's fine with me, 

20 too.

21 MEMBER MUNN: I'm here.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, so 
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1 it's Wednesday the 21st with Thursday as a 

2 backup.

3 MR. KATZ: Is that good for you too, 

4 Mark?

5 MEMBER GRIFFON: Thursday --

6 MR. KATZ: The 22nd.

7 MEMBER GRIFFON: Perhaps may not 

8 be as good. I may be going out of the country. 

9 So the --

10 MR. KATZ: Okay, we'll --

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: It will be a 

12 backup. It will be a backup, anyway.

13 MEMBER GRIFFON: I don't have my 

14 full itinerary yet, but close.

15 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Sure. 

16 Sure. Okay, so this is very good. Now let's 

17 go back with the 15 minutes that we have left, 

18 and let's talk about the review of sets 14 

19 through 18.

20 MR. KATZ: Yes.

21 MR. FARVER: Before we do that, I 

22 want to make note that there is still another 
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1 set of findings out there from AWE sites that 

2 we haven't looked at yet.

3 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: That are not 

4 part of 10 to 13?

5 MR. FARVER: They are part of 10 to 

6 13.

7 MR. KATZ: Oh, so why haven't --

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I wasn't 

9 aware of them.

10 MR. FARVER: Yes, this is -- these 

11 other site reports that we looked at --

12 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

13 MR. FARVER: It's not all other 

14 sites. It's not all the remaining sites.

15 MR. KATZ: Okay, so are you saying 

16 for those, Doug, that you don't have NIOSH 

17 responses?

18 MR. FARVER: Correct.

19 MR. KATZ: Okay, so those need to be 

20 our first priority.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: How many are 

22 we talking about roughly?
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1 MR. FARVER: Grady, do you know? I 

2 don't think it's very many.

3 MR. CALHOUN: I don't. I'm 

4 looking at -- trying to look at them right now. 

5 You've got the remaining sites.

6 MR. SIEBERT: I believe it's 11 

7 claims that we --

8 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, look, 

9 we can -- 11 we can -- so you folks should make 

10 sure that you have comments back and forth for 

11 those 11 or so, those dozen or so.

12 MR. FARVER: Right.

13 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And then we 

14 will add those on for May 21st. Scott and 

15 Grady, how might we help in terms of what you 

16 need for review of sets 14 through 18?

17 MR. KATZ: Scott has sent out, I 

18 think it was from Scott or Beth, and I 

19 circulated it to all of you, suggestions for how 

20 to carve them up. So that we handle them 

21 similarly to how we handled 10 through 13, which 

22 I think has worked pretty well.
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1 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right. Oh, 

2 the one where we break them up by site.

3 MR. KATZ: Yes.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: We go over a 

5 particular site.

6 MR. KATZ: Exactly. All of a part. 

7 And Beth has sent out, I thought it was very 

8 helpful, a breakdown according to those lines.

9 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Did other 

10 Subcommittee Members, do you recall seeing 

11 that? It seemed like a sensible approach.

12 MEMBER MUNN: Yes, that's fine. I 

13 would request, however, that when we send out 

14 those matrices, I would like to request that 

15 folks use my non-CDC address to send those out 

16 because those of us that have problems 

17 accessing Citrix sometimes can't get to our CDC 

18 email.

19 So it would be very helpful if you'd 

20 use my civilian email address.

21 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: But can we do 

22 that in terms of the security of the 
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1 information.

2 MEMBER MUNN: It seems to me, yes. 

3 Not most, not a great deal of the other

4 material, but the matrices I think are fine.

5 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

6 MR. KATZ: But the problem is, this 

7 matrix that they sent out, the email I thought 

8 I forwarded to you actually, Wanda, to your 

9 personal [email], the matrix included the Excel 

10 sheet, includes stuff that we cannot send to 

11 non-government sites.

12 MEMBER MUNN: Okay.

13 MR. KATZ: So that's the problem. 

14 But for those that don't have it in front of you, 

15 I have it in front of me now. What it has is, 

16 the breakdown is: Oak Ridge GDP 21 claims, 

17 Hanford/SRS -- this is in order of frequency --

18 Hanford/SRS 21 claims. Fernald, RFP, Mound 

19 and INL and NTS make up 21 claims. And then 

20 DCAS sites 17 claims. All others: 26 claims.

21 So that's the breakout. I think 

22 you know, if you guys haven't had time to give 
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1 it consideration, I mean [it’s] an easy way just 

2 to get this going so that the folks at NIOSH can 

3 spend this time productively.

4 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Well, I 

5 certainly remember seeing it, and it seemed 

6 perfectly sensible to me, also.

7 MR. KATZ: Yes, I was just going to 

8 say, I mean they could just start at the top of 

9 the list with Oak Ridge, which is --

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes.

11 MR. STIVER: It's up on the screen 

12 right now, the diagram.

13 MR. KATZ: Okay, thank you, John.

14 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: No reason 

15 that -- there's no particular reason that any 

16 order is in order. So whatever order it is on 

17 the screen, and that Kathy sent to us, that 

18 sounds fine.

19 We did talk earlier today about 

20 whether when people were reviewing the sets, 

21 how we were going to handle the categorization 

22 of errors or problems. You folks, SC&A and 
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1 NIOSH, do not need that. We can still talk 

2 about how to get started.

3 But we probably do want to revisit 

4 that. Or talk about it sometime early on when 

5 we get to 14. Right?

6 MR. KATZ: Yes.

7 MR. FARVER: This is Doug. And I 

8 just wanted to point out, I have put out the 

9 matrices for the 14th through 18th set on the 

10 O: drive.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Good.

12 MR. FARVER: It's going to be our 

13 Subcommittee, I think it's under matrices. I 

14 also put there an Excel spreadsheet, which has 

15 all the findings from all the 14 through 18 

16 cases. So it's easy to sort.

17 But I do not have the A to F codes 

18 put in there, in those findings.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Right.

20 MR. FARVER: And that's what we 

21 were trying to hash out earlier. Do you want 

22 those codes, or would you like some kind of 
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1 different code? Because we already have the 

2 finding identifier which tells you whether it 

3 was an internal dose issue.

4 But I just want to point out, I do 

5 not have those codes added to the findings. 

6 Now we can always add those even as we go.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: I think we 

8 can add them as we go. And in fact it might be 

9 better if we do so.

10 MR. FARVER: It probably is.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: And the 

12 other thing is, I assume that there's enough 

13 space that we might put more than one 

14 designation of something like A through F. 

15 Because some of them -- we're talking about some 

16 of the errors involve both.

17 MR. FARVER: Right, I mean this 

18 comes back --

19 MR. STIVER: This is John. I 

20 thought we were going to -- it was my 

21 recollection from this morning that we would go 

22 ahead and leave the codes as is. And then you 
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1 know, once we discuss them, if we determine that 

2 it should be in a different category, then we 

3 can make that change, especially when we have 

4 a set of completely reviewed findings and we 

5 have a pretty solid feel for a category that it 

6 would go into.

7 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Fine, which 

8 is to say there's no problem expanding that if 

9 we want to put in two letters, or --

10 MR. STIVER: Right, right.

11 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay, fine. 

12 I just want to make sure that's fine.

13 So, Scott, Grady, is that 

14 sufficient?

15 MR. SIEBERT: Yes, that's great. I 

16 do have one clarification, I believe I 

17 understand something, I just want to be very 

18 clear.

19 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Okay.

20 MR. SIEBERT: We never got, that 

21 I'm aware of, any findings from a 17th set. It 

22 goes 14, 15, 16, 18. I believe that's because 
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1 the 17th set was the blind set.

2 MR. KATZ: That's correct.

3 MR. SIEBERT: Okay. I just wanted 

4 to verify that to make sure. Because all the 

5 numbers that I've put together are 14 through 

6 18 without any 17th set.

7 MR. KATZ: Right, yes, that's 

correct. The 17th 8 set is the blinds.

9 MR. SIEBERT: Okay.

10 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: But there's 

11 also a 19 that's blind, right? I thought we 

12 once went over a 19?

13 MR. STIVER: The 19 would be the new 

14 set that we're going to --

15 MR. KATZ: The 19th is the set that 

16 I just assigned, I think. Isn't it?

17 MR. STIVER: That's true.

18 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Alright. 

19 Oh, excuse me, of course.

20 MR. KATZ: So SC&A's just starting 

21 work on those.

22 CHAIRMAN KOTELCHUCK: Yes, good, 
240

NEAL R. GROSS

COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com

1 good. Okay, folks, we have done yeoman's work 

2 over these last two days. I think we are ready 

3 to call it quits for the day. We must be done 

4 by 4:30 and I don't believe we have time to give 

5 adequate consideration to another case.

6 So I would like to call this meeting 

7 to a close.

8 (Whereupon, the above-entitled 

9 matter went off the record at 4:23 p.m.)

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