Biomonitoring of Occupational Exposure to Styrene

Urinary styrene in the biological monitoring of styrene exposure.

“…The correlations between airborne styrene and its metabolite concentrations were generally a little lower than for urinary styrene, but of the same order currently reported by others (8,10,25,26) . In our end-shift samples we observed no definite improvement in the correlation coefficients when the sum of MA and PGA was used instead of MA only, while PGA alone was less related to the exposure levels.…”

“…The correlation with exposure was of the same order, or possibly better, as those observed for metabolites in Scand J Work Environ Health 1993, vol 19, no 3 Urinary styrene nmot-r' 3000. ------------------- other field studies reported in the literature (8,10,(24)(25)(26).…”

“…1-1 (3). Other exposure tests, such as styrene in expired air (4)(5)(6)(7) or in blood (8)(9)(10), present some limitations, and available data on field application are limited (1). Finally, the measurement of minor metabolites, such as hippuric acid or 4-vinylphenol, is still not considered reliable.…”

Inter- and intra-individual sources of variation in levels of urinary styrene metabolites

“…Among the biological monitoring methods available, measurements of urinary MA and PGA are the most commonly used biological indices of exposure to styrene. Numerous investigations have focused on the relationship between these metabolites with airborne styrene concentrations or on their relationship with each other (EngstroÈ m et al 1976;Guillemin et al 1982;Ikeda et al 1982;Apostoli et al 1983;Franchini et al 1983; Bartolucci et al 1986;De Rosa et al 1988;Imbriani et al 1990;Brenner et al 1991;Galassi et al 1993;Pekari et al 1993;Marhuenda et al 1997;Ghittori et al 1997;Apostoli et al 1998). Despite the considerable attention that MA and PGA have received in the literature, we are aware of no study that has quanti®ed the sources of variation in levels of these two biomarkers among workers exposed to styrene.…”

Biomarkers and their use in occupational medicine

“…This information is well advanced for many chemicals that are mainly absorbed in the body via inhalation, for example, styrene (3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8). On the other hand, for several chemicals, for example, dimethylformamide (9-13), the picture is less clear.…”