Tetracycline antibiotics in hospital and municipal wastewaters: a pilot study in Portugal

Abstract

This study investigated the occurrence of tetracyclines (TCs), namely minocycline (MIN), TC, and its epimer epitetracycline (ETC), and doxycycline (DC), in four hospital wastewater effluents and its fate in municipal wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs), in Coimbra, Portugal. Analytical determination was carried out by solid-phase extraction followed by liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection. A gradient system with a mobile phase containing oxalic acid 0.02 M and acetonitrile was used. After postcolumn derivatization with magnesium reagent, TCs were detected at lambda(exc) 386 nm and lambda(em) 500 nm. The proposed method allowed good sensitivity, accuracy, and precision. LOQs were 0.5 microg l(-1) for ETC and TC and 15 and 5 microg l(-1) for MIN and DC, respectively. The recovery values ranged between 66.4% and 117.1%, and intraday and interday repeatability was lower than 6.8%. The method was successfully used to determine the presence of the above-mentioned TCs in 24 wastewater composite samples obtained from hospital effluents and from influent and effluent of the WWTP located in Coimbra, Portugal. MIN and TC were found in 41.7% of the samples; ETC and DC were found in 25% and 8.3% of the samples, respectively. The levels found ranged from 6 to 531.7 microg l(-1) in hospital effluents, while its concentrations in WWTP ranged from 95.8 to 915.3 microg l(-1). A seasonal influence in the concentrations found has also been observed, the levels found in samples collected during spring being higher than those observed in samples collected during autumn; however, these are only preliminary results. The WWTP removal rate ranged between 89.5% and 100%.

Occurrence of Veterinary Antibiotics and Chemotherapeutics in Fresh Water, Sediment, and Fish of the Rivers and Lakes in Poland

“…Because the main pathways of antibiotic discharges to the aquatic environment are pharmaceutical manufacturers, residential care facilities, hospitals, and wastewater treatment plants, most of studies were performed in urban agglomerations. Usually, the studies concerned human and veterinary antibiotics in wastewater (2,4,5,10,12) and in surface water and sediment from rivers and lakes located in the centre of urban areas (1, 4, 6, 8, 9, 13, 15-17). There are a few publications about antibiotics in farmed fish or shrimps (11,14).…”

“…There are a few publications about antibiotics in farmed fish or shrimps (11,14). Antibiotic occurrence in aquatic environments is reported especially in China (2,(15)(16)(17), USA (5), UK (1), Spain (13), Germany (12), and Portugal (10). Most of these publications reported the presence of sulfonamides (sulfamethoxazole, sulfamethazine,), macrolides (erythromycin), diaminopyrimidines (trimethoprim), tetracyclines (tetracycline, oxytetracycline), and fluoroquinolones (norfloxacin, ciprofloxacin).…”

“…Several publications have reported the occurrence of various veterinary and human pharmaceuticals, including antibiotics, in surface water, groundwater, wastewater, sediments, and soil. Most of the publications reported the occurrence of sulfonamides (1, 2, 4-6, 9-11, 13, 15-17), fluoroquinolones (2,4,5,10,15,17), tetracyclines (4, 7-10, 13, 17), and macrolides (2,4,7,8,13,15,16) in samples from different sources within the aquatic environment.…”

Sources identification of antibiotic pollution combining land use information and multivariate statistics

“…This component was heavily weighted by DOC, TC, OTC, and SMX. DOC, TC, and SMX have been detected in waste water of hospital and in effluent of municipal wastewater treatment plant (Pena et al 2010;Rossmann et al 2014). The higher concentration of TC, OTC, and SMX was reported in aquaculture (Rose and Pedersen 2005;Seyfried et al 2010;Zhang et al 2013).…”

Photocatalytic Treatment Techniques using Titanium Dioxide Nanoparticles for Antibiotic Removal from Water

“…The antibiotic tested in this work was oxytetracycline (OTC) is a widely used broad spectrum antibiotic, especially employed in veterinary medicine [9,10] and for human therapy [11]. It can be found not only in raw and treated wastewaters but also in surface water sources [12].…”