THE MEASUREMENT OF TESTOSTERONE IN HAIR

Trace metals and drugs have been measured in hair for a number of year s but there are no published papers on the measurement of steroids in human hair. We report here the measurement of testosterone in hair sam ples taken from men, women and prepubertal children. This was a prelim inary investigation to see whether testosterone was detectable in hair and whether concentrations between men and women, and men and prepube rtal children were different in line with concentrations of testostero ne in the blood. Hair was digested in sodium hydroxide and the testost erone extracted before measurement by radioimmuno- assay. There was a clear difference between testosterone concentrations found in hair col lected from men (12.9-77.7 pmol/g) and those found in hair from women (<0.9-10.8 pmol/g). There was no significant difference between the co ncentrations found in women and children. The authenticity of the test osterone measured was confirmed with GCMS.