Correlation between concentrations of n-hexane and toluene in exhaled and environmental air in an occupationally exposed population
✍ Scribed by J. Francisco Periago; Antonio Morente; Manuel Villanueva; Aurelio Luna
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1994
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 408 KB
- Volume
- 14
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0260-437X
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✦ Synopsis
We determined the correlations between the concentrations of n-hexane and toluene in exhaled and environmental air in the shoe manufacturing industry. Data were collected in 1988 and in 1992 from a total of 265 subjects. Environmental air samples were collected with personal diffusive samplers by adsorption on activated charcoal during exposure and from end-expired air (alveolar air) on cartridges of activated charcoal after exposure. Both compounds were desorbed with carbon disulphide and analysed by gas chromatography. Linear regression analyses showed a good correlation between environmental and end-expired air concentrations ( r = 0.82 for n-hexane and r = 0.81 for toluene). These correlations allowed us to calculate the concentrations in expired air corresponding to current environmental limit values. The calculated concentrations in endexpired air that correspond to current environmental threshold limit values of 176 mg m-3 for n-hexane and 377 mg 11-~fortolueneare28 mg m-3(95% confidencelimit,27-29 mg m-')and40 mg m-'(95% confidence limit, 3941 mg mP3), respectively. Similar correlations were found when the data from the two study periods were analysed separately.