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Updated: Aug 17, 2026
The Use of Gas Chromatography to Analyze Compositional Changes of Fatty Acids in Rat Liver Tissue during Pregnancy
Published on: March 13, 2014
Fatty Acid ethyl esters: quantitative biomarkers for maternal alcohol consumption
Cynthia F Bearer1, Luis Manuel Santiago, Mary Ann O'Riordan
1Department of Pediatrics, Case Western Reserve University, School of Medicine, Cleveland, Ohio, USA. cynthia.bearer@case.edu
Objective:
To develop a laboratory marker to identify newborns exposed to alcohol.
Study Design:
Meconium was collected from 30 infants from Jordan who were unexposed and from 248 Cleveland study infants of varying exposure status. Retrospective maternal alcohol histories were obtained. Fatty acid ethyl esters (FAEEs) were quantified with gas chromatography/flame ionization and compared between abstainers and non-abstainers to identify FAEEs of interest. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve, sensitivity, specificity, and positive and negative predictive values were calculated by using definitions of drinking obtained from a graphical representation.
Results:
Six of 7 FAEEs were significantly different between the non-abstainers and at least 1 of 2 of the abstaining groups. FAEEs best predicted drinks per drinking day, and ethyl linoleate had the greatest area under the curve (76%), with a sensitivity rate of 88%, a specificity rate of 64%, a positive predictive value of 9%, and a negative predictive value of 99%. No combination of FAEEs was better than a single ester for identifying drinkers.
Conclusion:
Ethyl linoleate in meconium is a useful biological marker for identifying infants not exposed in utero to high levels of alcohol in a high-risk, substance-abusing, clinic-based sample.
