In an attempt to establish a more realistic and reliable model for relating environmental exposure measurements to the biological indices of exposure, a study was undertaken to quantify the total sources of lead exposure among lead storage battery workers. In addition to the usual personal and area lead air sampling, quantitative and repeatable measurements of removable lead from work surfaces and the workers' hands and faces were obtained daily for ten consecutive work days in the pasting and battery assembly departments. Mathematical correlations of blood lead and zinc protoporphyrin (ZPP) levels as the dependent variable with the lead exposure sources were derived and demonstrated most strongly as log-log relationships. Statistical analyses by computer programming indicated that the airborne, hand, facial and work surface levels have a high degree of inter-correlation with a very significant positive individual correlation with blood lead levels and a somewhat lower correlation with ZPP. The results suggest that contaminated personal and work surfaces may play a more significant role in toxic occupational and environmental exposures, generally, than had heretofore been demonstrated or suspected.

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Although wipe testing has been used extensively as a measure of surface contamination in industrial hygiene, few scientific studies have been reported to validate the procedure with respect to quantitative recovery, repeatability or methodology. Consequently, a laboratory evaluation of wipe testing with particular attention to the OSHA procedure was undertaken using lead oxide dust as the test contaminant. A dust dispersion system was devised using a Wright dust feeder to produce relatively uniform surface concentrations in an aerosol chamber. Wipe materials included moistened filter paper, commercial paper towels, adhesive paper labels and adhesive tape. The quantitative recovery and repeatability of the wipe procedures were related to surface concentrations and the operational and material variables. Significant improvements in recoveries of up to 90% can be obtained with good repeatability for removable lead oxide dust on non-porous surfaces using moist paper on a fixed test surface area. For porous surfaces, which show significantly lower recovery by all methods, adhesive sampling materials applied at maximum pressure provided an optimum recovery of 77%. The importance of reliable surface contamination measurements in assessing potential health hazards underscores the desirability of improving the demonstrated deficiencies of the OSHA and other wipe sampling procedures.