SIMULTANEOUS DETERMINATION OF ALCOHOLS AND ETHYLENE-GLYCOL IN SERUM BY PACKED-COLUMN OR CAPILLARY-COLUMN GAS-CHROMATOGRAPHY

We developed a packed-column chromatographic procedure capable of simu ltaneous quantitation of methanol, ethanol, isopropanol, acetone, and ethylene glycol. This method was then updated to a rapid, sensitive, w ide-bore capillary method. The packed-column system uses direct inject ion of 1 mu L of Na2WO4/H2SO4-deproteinized serum onto a 1.8 m x 2 mm (i.d.) column packed with 80/100 HayeSep R. A linear temperature gradi ent from 90 to 205 degrees C allows complete elution of all components within 20 min; minimum detection limits are 2 mmol/L. The wide-bore c apillary method uses 0.1 mu L Of sample deproteinized by ultrafiltrati on, injected onto a 30 m x 0.53 mm (i.d.) 3-mu m Rtx-200 (Restek) colu mn. Baseline resolution to a minimum detection limit of 0.1 mmol/L of all compounds is achieved in 5 min with a linear temperature gradient from 40 to 250 degrees C and dual internal standards of n-propanol and 1,2-butanediol.