title: Regional dependence of urinary uranium baseline levels in non-exposed subjects with particular reference to volunteers from Northern Italy.
abstract: Knowledge of the level of natural uranium (U) in the human body is fundamental in order to estimate the potentially hazardous incorporation in accidentally exposed subjects. A constant monitoring of exposed workers needs reliable reference baseline values, which can be determined by measuring the U concentration in urine. ICPMS has proven to be a fast, reliable and highly sensitive technique for this purpose. Non-uniformity in the distribution of U levels in various regions and differences in dietary habits account for the significant regional variations of U concentration in urine in non-exposed subjects. In this paper, the determination of daily uranium urinary excretion levels in a group of 12 non-exposed subjects from Northern Italy is presented and compared to data present in the published literature and to values obtained in a larger group of German volunteers. The urinary U output values observed in the Italian subset are generally higher than the corresponding levels measured in other groups. This could be the result of a higher intake of U from liquids, as assessed by the determination of U concentration in drinking waters.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Fisica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Sezione di Fisica Medica, via Celoria 16 I-20133 Milano, Italy.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Bagatti
authors.forename: M C
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Cantone
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Giussani
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Veronese
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Roth
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Werner
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Höllriegl
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002648:Child; D004032:Diet; D004781:Environmental Exposure; D005260:Female; D005858:Germany; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012016:Reference Values; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D014501:Uranium / Q000652:urine*; D014881:Water Supply
chemical_list: D014501:Uranium