Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D assay. Evalution of chromatographic and non-chromatographic procedures

A competitive protein binding assay for serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D is described in which normal human serum is used as the source of binding protein. A serum sample is extracted with diethyl ether/methanol and then chromatographed using silica gel. Validation of the method is reported. Silica gel chromatography is compared with LH20 chromatography. The method is also compared with extraction techniques using diethyl ether and ethanol without subsequent chromatography. It is concluded that chromatography with either silica gel or LH20 is essential. The non-chromatographic methods investigated, in addition to giving much higher values than chromatographic methods, did not meet validation requirements with respect to accuracy and behaviour of samples on dilution.