- Review Article
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An overview of boron, lithium, and strontium in human health and profiles of these elements in urine of Japanese
Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine volume 12, pages 231–237 (2007)
Abstract
The biological, medical and environmental roles of trace elements have attracted considerable attention over the years. In spite of their relevance in nutritional, occupational and toxicological aspects, there is still a lack of consistent and reliable measurement techniques and reliable information on reference values. In this review our understandings of the urinary profilings of boron, lithium and strontium are summarized and fundamental results obtained in our laboratory are discussed.
Over the past decade we have successfully used inductively coupled plasma emission spectrometry for the determination of reference values for urinary concentrations of boron, lithium and strontium. Taking into account the short biological half-life of these elements and the fact that their major excretion route is via the kidney, urine was considered to be a suitable material for monitoring of exposure to these elements. We confirmed that urinary concentrations of boron, lithium and strontium follow a lognormal distribution. The geometric mean reference values and 95% confidence intervals were 798 μg/l (398–1599 μg/l) for boron, 23.5 μg/l (11.0–50.5 μg/l) for lithium and 143.9 μg/l (40.9–505.8 μg/l) for strontium. There were no discrepancies between our values and those previously reported. Our reference values and confidential intervals can be used as guidelines for the health screening of Japanese individuals to evaluate environmental or occupational exposure to these elements.
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This article is based on research that received the Encouragement Award given at the 77th Annual Meeting of the Japansese Society for Hygiene, Osaka, Japan on March 25–28, 2007.
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Usuda, K., Kono, K., Dote, T. et al. An overview of boron, lithium, and strontium in human health and profiles of these elements in urine of Japanese. Environ Health Prev Med 12, 231–237 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02898029
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02898029