Connecting inorganic mercury and lead measurements in blood to dietary sources of exposure that may impact child development

Table 1 Summary of methods for the determination of blood Hg and Pb measurements

Analyte	Sample and sample size	Method	Limit of detection	Ref.
Hg	Blood (20-30 mL)	CV-AAS	NA	[34]
	Red blood cells1		NA	[40]
	Blood (3-5 mL)		NA	[41]
	Red blood cells (0.4 mL), plasma (0.5 mL)		0.09 ng/mL	[42]
Hg	Blood1	CV-AFS	0.09 μg/L2	[31]
	Blood (0.5 g)		0.001 μg/L	[43]
Hg	Blood (20 mL)	DMA	0.01 μg/L	[47,48]
Pb	Blood (3-5 mL)	AAS	NA	[35]
	Blood (3 mL)		25.01 µg/L	[38]
	Blood (3-5 mL)		NA	[41]
	Blood (3-5 mL)		0.03 μg/dL	[55]
Pb	Blood1	GF-AAS	2.85 μg/dL2	[31]
	Blood (20-30 mL)		NA	[34]
	Blood (50 µL)		0.042 μg/dL	[36]
	Blood (20 mL)		0.01 μg/dL	[47]
	Blood1, hair (1 g)		NA	[56]
	Blood (0.5-2 mL)		25 μg/L	[57]
Pb	Bone1	X-ray fluorescence	2 µg/g	[38]
Hg, Pb	Blood (1 mL), hair (5-10 mg)	ICP-MS	NA	[30]
	Blood (2-3 mL)		0.25 μg/L (Hg)	[32]
	Blood (2-3 mL)		0.25 μg/dL (Pb)	[32]
	Blood (20-30 mL)		0.1 μg/L (Hg)	[34]
	Blood (20-30 mL)		0.002 μg/dL (Pb)	[34]
	Blood1		1.3 μg/dL (Pb)	[37]
	Blood1		0.24 μg/L (Hg)	[45]
	Blood (20 mL)		0.3 μg/dL (Pb)	[59]
Hg, Pb	Blood (46 µL)	DBS with ICP-MS	0.65 μg/L (Hg)	[60]
	Blood (46 µL)		0.27 μg/dL (Pb)	[60]
	Blood (30 µL)		NA	[61]
	Blood (50 µL)		0.13 ppb2 (Hg)	[62]
	Blood (50 µL)		2.38 ppb2 (Pb)	[62]
	Blood (6.2 µL)		0.7 μg/L (Hg)	[63]
Methylmercury	Blood (0.5 g)	GC-CV-AFS	0.0001 μg/L	[43]
	Dental amalgam1		NA	[50]
	Blood (0.5 mL)		0.1 pg/L	[51]
I-Hg, methylmercury	Blood (0.5 g)	GC-ICP-MS with SIDMS	NA	[26]
I-Hg, methylmercury	Blood (35-50 µL)	DBS with GC-CV-AFS	0.3 μg/L (methylmercury)	[64]
	Blood (40-60 µL)		1.9 μg/L (I-Hg)	[65]
	Blood (40-60 µL)			[65]

¹Sample size unspecified.

²Lowest detected concentration reported in the study (limit of detection not available).

NA: Limit of detection and lowest detected concentration not available; CV-AAS: Cold vapor atomic absorption spectrometry; CV-AFS: CV-AAS to atomic fluorescence spectrometry; DMA: Direct mercury analysis; AAS: Atomic absorption spectrometry; GF-AAS: Graphite furnace AAS; ICP-MS: Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry; SIDMS: Speciated isotope dilution mass spectrometry; DBS: Dried blood spot.