Rapid screening of tetrodotoxin in urine and plasma of patients with puffer fish poisoning by HPLC with creatinine correction

• Published in: Food additives & contaminants. Part A, Chemistry, analysis, control, exposure & risk assessment Vol. 27; no. 1; pp. 89 - 96
• Main Authors: Yu, Chung-Him, Yu, Chun-Fai, Tam, Sidney, Hoi-Fu Yu, Peter
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Abingdon Taylor & Francis Group 01-01-2010; Taylor & Francis; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Adult; Animals; Biological and medical sciences; Chromatography; Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid - standards; clean-up; Correlation analysis; Creatinine - urine; Extraction processes; fish and fish products; Fish and seafood industries; Food contamination & poisoning; Food Contamination - analysis; Food industries; Foodborne Diseases - blood; Foodborne Diseases - diagnosis; Foodborne Diseases - urine; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Hong Kong; HPLC; Humans; Indexing in process; Male; natural toxicants; Plasma; seafood; Seafood - poisoning; Solid Phase Extraction; SPME; Tetraodontiformes; Tetrodotoxin - blood; Tetrodotoxin - poisoning; Tetrodotoxin - standards; Tetrodotoxin - urine; toxicology; Toxins; Urine; Hong Kong; Urine; Biological fluid; clean-up; HPLC chromatography; Seafood; Natural; natural toxicants; Screening; Vertebrata; Toxicology; Analysis method; SPME; Pisces; chromatography; Fish product; fish and fish products; Poisoning; Teleostei; HPLC; Osteichthyes
• ISSN: 1944-0049; 1944-0057
• DOI: 10.1080/02652030903207250

A rapid and simple detection method for tetrodotoxin (TTX) in urine and plasma of patients with puffer fish poisoning was developed using commercially pre-packed solid-phase extraction (SPE) cartridges (C18 and weak cation exchange columns) and subsequent analyses by HPLC with UV detection. The detection limit of the standard TTX, TTX-spiked urine and plasma samples were all 10 ng/ml and the average TTX recovery in urine and plasma samples after SPE were 90.3 ± 4.0 and 87.1 ± 2.9%, respectively. It was noticed that the creatinine-adjusted urinary TTX levels obtained within the first 24 h of presentation apparently correlated much better with the severity of poisoning than the urinary TTX concentration without adjusting for variations in concomitant creatinine excretion.