Multi-residue method for the analysis of pharmaceuticals and some of their metabolites in bivalves

• Published in: Talanta
• Main Authors: Álvarez-Muñoz, Diana, Huerta Buitrago, Belinda, Fernández Tejedor, M., Rodríguez Mozaz, Sara, Barceló i Cullerés, Damià
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2015
• Subjects: Contaminants; Pollutants; Contaminants persistents; Persistent pollutants; Mar > Contaminació; Marine pollution; Pacific; Venus; Crassostrea gigas; Pacific oyster
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10256/12614; http://hdl.handle.net/10503/36777; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.talanta.2014.12.035

A fast, simple and robust method has been developed for the simultaneous determination of 23 pharmaceuticals (including some major metabolites) in bivalve mollusks. The analytes belong to eight different therapeutic groups: antibiotics, psychiatric drugs, analgesics/anti-inflammatories, tranquilizer, calcium channel blockers, diuretic, and prostatic hyperplasia. The method is based on pressurized liquid extraction (PLE) followed by solid phase extraction clean-up (SPE), and ultra performance liquid chromatography–triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (UHPL–MS/MS) for the identification and quantification of the target analytes. It has been developed and validated in three different species of bivalves: Crassostrea gigas (Pacific oyster), Mytilus galloprovincialis (Mediterranean mussel), and Chamelea gallina (striped venus clam). The majority of the compounds were extracted with a recovery between 40 and 115%. The developed analytical method allowed the determination of the compounds in the lower ng/g concentration levels. The relative standard deviation was under 12% for the intra-day and 20% inter-day analyses, respectively. Finally, the method was applied to oyster, clam and mussel samples collected from the Ebro delta, Spain. The most ubiquitous compounds detected were the psychiatric drug venlanfaxine and the antibiotic azithromycin, with the highest concentrations found in mussel (2.7 ng/g dw) and oyster (3.0 ng/g dw), respectively. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that azithromycin has been reported in environmental samples of marine biota The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007 2013) under the EC safe SEAFOOD project (grant agreement no.311820). The scientific facilities of ICRA have been cofinanced by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) and by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) in the frame of the Catalonia ERDF Operative programme 2007–2013. This work was partly supported by the Generalitat de Catalunya (Consolidated Research Group: Catalan Institute for Water Research 2014 SGR 291)