Biomonitoring in California firefighters: metals and perfluorinated chemicals
Dina Dobraca1, Leslie Israel, Sandra McNeel
1From the Environmental Health Investigations Branch (Ms Dobraca, Dr McNeel, Mr Voss, and Dr Das) and Environmental Health Laboratory (Drs Gajek, Barley, and She), California Department of Public Health, Richmond; Center for Occupational and Environmental Health (Dr Israel), University of California, Irvine; and Environmental Chemistry Laboratory (Drs Wang, Park, and Harwani), Department of Toxic Substances Control, California Environmental Protection Agency, Berkeley.
Objective:
To assess California firefighters' blood concentrations of selected chemicals and compare with a representative US population.
Methods:
We report laboratory methods and analytic results for cadmium, lead, mercury, and manganese in whole blood and 12 serum perfluorinated chemicals in a sample of 101 Southern California firefighters.
Results:
Firefighters' blood metal concentrations were all similar to or lower than the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) values, except for six participants whose mercury concentrations (range: 9.79 to 13.42 μg/L) were close to or higher than the NHANES reporting threshold of 10 μg/L. Perfluorodecanoic acid concentrations were elevated compared with NHANES and other firefighter studies.
Conclusions:
Perfluorodecanoic acid concentrations were three times higher in this firefighter group than in NHANES adult males. Firefighters may have unidentified sources of occupational exposure to perfluorinated chemicals.
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