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Health-related reference intervals for heavy metals in non-exposed young adults

  • Chiara Di Resta , Francesco Paleari , Assunta Naclerio , Floriana Iannace , Roberto Leone , Ivan Shashkin , Marco Fumagalli , Chiara Sacco , Lucia Bellocchi , Massimo Locatelli , Giuseppe Banfi EMAIL logo , Paola M.V. Rancoita and Rossella Tomaiuolo ORCID logo
Published/Copyright: June 16, 2025
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Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (CCLM)
From the journal Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (CCLM) Volume 63 Issue 10

Abstract

Objectives

Heavy metals (HMs) concentrations vary with living environments, diet, and personal habits. This study aims to establish health-related reference intervals (RIs) for selected HMs in healthy, non-occupationally exposed young adults living in an urban environment.

Methods

The Uni4Me study enrolled 154 healthy university volunteers (median age: 23 years) to assess the concentrations of seven HMs (lead, nickel, cadmium, zinc, chromium, cobalt, and mercury) using inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) and inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-EOS). CLSI guidelines were followed to estimate the 2.5th and 97.5th percentiles as RIs.

Results

Most metals were detected at low concentrations. Zinc showed consistent physiological levels in all participants. Mercury and chromium were the most frequently detected, indicating potential environmental or dietary exposure.

Conclusions

This study defines baseline values for HMs in an urban, healthy, young adult population. These results may support future biomonitoring efforts and public health initiatives targeting subclinical exposure in non-occupationally exposed populations.

Keywords: biomonitoring; reference values; heavy metals
Corresponding author: Professor Giuseppe Banfi, Faculty of Medicine and Surgery, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, 20132, Milan, Italy; and IRCCS Galeazzi-Sant’Ambrogio, 20157, Milan, Italy, E-mail:

Funding source: Regione Lombardia _ Italy

Award Identifier / Grant number: Progetto Neon

Acknowledgments

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the International Medical Doctor Program (IMDP) students at UniSR for their enthusiasm and participation as volunteers in this study. Their active collaboration was instrumental in achieving the research objectives. Special thanks to the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Prof. Flavia Valtorta, and the Dean of the IMDP, Prof. Andrea Salonia, of Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, for their steadfast support and encouragement throughout the project.

  1. Research ethics: The Ethical Committee approved the study protocol (Uni4Me, V1.1, 2022/01/26).

  2. Informed consent: Informed consent was obtained from all individuals included in this study.

  3. Author contributions: All authors have accepted responsibility for the entire content of this manuscript and approved its submission.

  4. Use of Large Language Models, AI and Machine Learning Tools: None declared.

  5. Conflict of interest: The authors state no conflict of interest.

  6. Research funding: The financial support was provided by “Project Neon”-Regione Lombardia.

  7. Data availability: The raw data are available in the Institutional Repository.

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Supplementary Material

This article contains supplementary material (https://doi.org/10.1515/cclm-2025-0076).

Received: 2025-01-21
Accepted: 2025-05-27
Published Online: 2025-06-16
Published in Print: 2025-09-25

© 2025 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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https://doi.org/10.1515/cclm-2025-0076
Keywords for this article
biomonitoring; reference values; heavy metals

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Editorial
  3. Quality indicators: an evolving target for laboratory medicine
  4. Reviews
  5. Regulating the future of laboratory medicine: European regulatory landscape of AI-driven medical device software in laboratory medicine
  6. The spectrum of nuclear patterns with stained metaphase chromosome plate: morphology nuances, immunological associations, and clinical relevance
  7. Opinion Papers
  8. Comprehensive assessment of medical laboratory performance: a 4D model of quality, economics, velocity, and productivity indicators
  9. Detecting cardiac injury: the next generation of high-sensitivity cardiac troponins improving diagnostic outcomes
  10. Perspectives
  11. Can Theranos resurrect from its ashes?
  12. Guidelines and Recommendations
  13. Australasian guideline for the performance of sweat chloride testing 3rd edition: to support cystic fibrosis screening, diagnosis and monitoring
  14. General Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine
  15. Recommendations for the integration of standardized quality indicators for glucose point-of-care testing
  16. A cost-effective assessment for the combination of indirect immunofluorescence and solid-phase assay in ANA-screening
  17. Assessment of measurement uncertainty of immunoassays and LC-MS/MS methods for serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D
  18. A novel immunoprecipitation-based targeted liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry analysis for accurate determination for copeptin in human serum
  19. Histamine metabolite to basal serum tryptase ratios in systemic mastocytosis and hereditary alpha tryptasemia using a validated LC-MS/MS approach
  20. Machine learning algorithms with body fluid parameters: an interpretable framework for malignant cell screening in cerebrospinal fluid
  21. Impact of analytical bias on machine learning models for sepsis prediction using laboratory data
  22. Immunochemical measurement of urinary free light chains and Bence Jones proteinuria
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  24. High myoglobin plasma samples risk being reported as falsely low due to antigen excess – follow up after a 2-year period of using a mitigating procedure
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  26. Commutability evaluation of glycated albumin candidate EQA materials
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  30. Practical handling of hemolytic, icteric and lipemic samples for coagulation testing in European laboratories. A collaborative survey from the European Organisation for External Quality Assurance Providers in Laboratory Medicine (EQALM)
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