Determination of di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate levels in human blood plasma and cryoprecipitates.

Abstract

While investigating the possible occurrence of neutral plasmalogens in human blood, we isolated a substance which had the same chromatographic characteristics on thin-layer chromatoplates as those of alkyl diglycerides. This substance was identified (1) as di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP), and we were able to demonstrate (2) that this plastifier originated from the plastic transfusion packs which had contained the blood and that its concentration increased with the time of storage up to a level of about 11.5 mg/100 ml of plasma after 21 days. These observations were confirmed by Jaeger and Rubin (3), who have also shown that DEPH accumulates in liver cells during the perfusion of rat liver. These authors also found that liver, spleen, lung, and abdominal fat in two patients who had received blood transfusions contained significant quantities of DEHP. In the present report, we describe a direct method of determination of DEHP by gasliquid chromatography. With this method, we have been able to demonstrate that the leaching out of DEHP from plastic transufsion packs was correlated with the plasma concentration of triglycerides. Also the DEHP levels in cryoprecipitates, which are