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Drug Monitoring and Toxicology |
1
Division of Biomedical Sciences, School of Science, Sheffield Hallam University, Pond St., Sheffield S1 1WB, UK.
2
Ealing Hospital, Uxbridge Rd., Southall Middlesex
UB1 3HW, UK.
3
Department of Medical Microbiology, St. George's
Hospital Medical School, Cranmer Terrace, London SW17 0RE, UK.
a Author for correspondence. Fax 114 2533066 e-mail r.f.smith{at}shu.ac.uk.
The performance of a simple colorimetric assay for urinary nicotine metabolites to assess smoking status in diabetic subjects (n = 251) was investigated. Several variations of the colorimetric assay and a qualitative extraction procedure were evaluated in comparison with a cotinine immunoassay as the "gold standard." Among these, the best overall performance was achieved with the qualitative test (sensitivity 95%; specificity 100%). The quantitative measurement of total nicotine metabolites performed less well (sensitivity 92%; specificity 97%) but could be improved by incorporating a blank extraction (sensitivity 98%; specificity 98%). Allowance for diuresis appeared to offer no advantage over the other methods. These results support previous findings regarding the use of these colorimetric procedures in nondiabetic subjects and, contrary to other recent observations, their performance was not impaired in diabetic patients.
The following articles in journals at HighWire Press have cited this article:
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G. F. Cope Simple Colorimetric Procedures to Determine Smoking Status Clin. Chem., April 1, 1999; 45(4): 585 - 585. [Full Text] [PDF] |
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