title: Correlation between urinary nicotine, cotinine and self-reported smoking status among educated young adults.
abstract: The objective of this study was to correlate, differentiate and validate the self-reported smoking status of educated young adults with urinary biomarkers (i.e. nicotine and cotinine). Freshmen students were recruited on voluntary basis. They filled-up self-administered questionnaire and their urine samples were collected for analysis. The urinary nicotine (UN) and cotinine (UC) were measured by gas chromatograph-mass spectrometry. Smokers, non-smokers and ex-smokers were found to be both significantly correlated and different in their UN and UC levels. UC level of 25ng/ml was the optimal cut-off to differentiate smokers from non-smokers. Using this cut-off value, the prevalence of smoking among the students was found to be higher (15.4%) than the self-reported data (14.3%). UC is useful in validating individual recent smoking history and the cut-off could serve as a marker for assessing the clinical impact of smoking and environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure on human health.
authors.affiliation: National Poison Centre, Universiti National Poison Centre, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 11800 Penang, Malaysia.
authors.forename: Che Nin
authors.initials: CN
authors.lastname: Man
authors.forename: Ahmed Ibrahim
authors.initials: AI
authors.lastname: Fathelrahman
authors.forename: Gam Lay
authors.initials: GL
authors.lastname: Harn
authors.forename: Razak
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Lajis
authors.forename: Ahmad Shalihin Mohd
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Samin
authors.forename: Maizurah
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Omar
authors.forename: Rahmat
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Awang
authors.forename: Nurulain Abdullah
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Bayanuddin