Correlations of Trace Element Levels in the Diet, Blood, Urine, and Feces in the Chinese Male

Abstract

In order to explore the associations between trace elements in dietary intake and the other three biological media (blood, urine, or feces) and inter-element interactions among the latter, we simultaneously collected 72-h diet duplicates, whole blood, and 72-h urine and feces from 120 free-living healthy males in China. Correlations among the toxic (cadmium [Cd], lead [Pb]), and nutritionally essential (zinc [Zn], copper [Cu], iron [Fe], manganese [Mn], selenium [Se], iodine [I]) elements were evaluated using Spearman rank correlation analysis based on analytical data determined by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry. Dietary Cd intakes were highly correlated with the fecal Cd and blood Cd levels. Inverse correlations were found for Fe-Cd and Fe-Pb in both diet versus blood and diet versus feces. Cd-Zn and Cd-Se were significantly directly correlated in the urine and feces. Cd-Se and Pb-Se were negatively correlated in blood. In addition, there existed an extremely significant association between urinary Se and urinary I. Moreover, the other two highly direct correlations were found for Se-Fe and for I-Fe in urine. Improved knowledge regarding their mutual associations is considered to be of fundamental importance to understand more the complex interrelationships in trace element metabolism.

Determinants of serum cadmium levels in a Northern Italy community: A cross-sectional study

“…A correlation of dietary Cd, as assessed with food frequency questionnaires, with Cd levels in blood and urine has been found in some studies but not in others (Julin et al, 2011;Wang et al, 2012;Ikeda et al, 2015;Vacchi-Suzzi et al, 2015;Wang et al, 2015). Factors explaining this low concordance in the present study may be an inadequate assessment of dietary intake owing to an imprecise estimate of Cd content in foodstuffs, the low gastrointestinal absorption of Cd, generally in the order of 5% in adults (Andersen et al, 1992), the influence of other dietary variables such as fiber and iron which may modify Cd intake and metabolism (Berglund et al, 1994;Akesson et al, 2002;Olsson et al, 2002;Julin et al, 2011), and particularly the limited sample size.…”

Concentrations of toxic heavy metals and trace elements in raw milk of Simmental and Holstein-Friesian cows from organic farm

“…Wang et al (2012) reported correlations among the toxic (Cd, Pb) and nutritionally essential (Zn, Cu, Fe, Mn, Se) elements in the blood, also urine and feces in the male. In the case of the toxic metals, a significant positive correlation was found for Cd–Pb in blood and a moderate correlation in urine.…”

High iodine intake by preschool children in Miyagi prefecture, Japan

“…One is instrumental analysis using inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) after alkali digestion. ICP-MS [18] has been gaining popularities in recent years as a tool to measure iodine in various biological materials including foods [19][20][21][22][23]. The other is FCT-based estimation.…”