Re: badge sensitivity topic

[Scott Schwahn <schwahn@jlab.org>]

Ray Wery wrote:

> Radsafe
> Point 1.  While I rely on the film badge service to provide
> me with their estimate of the dose recieved by the badge, I
> also use information not available to the supplier,
> (interviews, review of work asignments, locations, body
> shielding, workloads,......) to estimate the dose that I
> actually believe was received by the individual to whom the
> badge was assigned.

I have to have a very good reason to assign a dose to an individual if
different than that provided by the vendor.  And it has to well documented.
Examples that are fairly easy to document are: worker wasn't even on site,
worker wore badge during diagnostic or therapeutic medical treatment, worker
turned in late and had no badge to subtract background and in-transit dose,
etc.  But I am very reticent to change a dose based on things that are very
difficult to document and defend, such as alleged locations, body shielding,
workloads, etc... I have seen very few cases where I would want to subject
myself to legal ramifications from that type of guesswork.  Better to take
the 100 mrem hit instead!  What's the harm?  Then again, I would have to go
to that extreme when approaching legal limits.  The dosimetry processor is
in effect a disinterested 3rd party, and 'adjusting' on your part could be
seen badly.

> Does anyong have a reference on how this may be
> influenced by actual wear conditions, especially oblique
> incidence of the radiation in question?

There is a good chapter in 'Applications of New Technology: External
Dosimetry,' Proceedings from the 1996 HPS Summer School.  Dr. Warren Reece
wrote chapter 16, 'Assessment of Effective Dose Equivalent from Dosimeter
Response,' which addresses this question.

--

Scott O. Schwahn, CHP
Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility
schwahn@jlab.org


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