Evaluation of Diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) Leached from Packaging Bags into Different Brands of Physiological Saline Solutions Obtained in Ibadan, South-Western Nigeria.

Diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) is used as plasticizer in plastics and other polymer materials which are found in medical devices, blood bags, physiological saline bags and infusion tube. Phthalates do not bind to these polymers; but leach extensively into the fluids in them. This had been proposed as a means of DEHP exposure to patients who had physiological saline infused into them. However, there had been paucity of data to support this argument. Hence this study examined the level of DEHP in five brands of physiological saline solution and their packaging bags. For each brand, Soxhlet extraction using DCM: n-hexane (23:6) was used to extract the saline solution bag, while DCM was used to extract the saline solution followed by cleanup with silica gel in open column. Each cleanup extract was reconstituted into acetonitrile and analysed with HPLC-UV at 226 nm. The solution bags had a mean DEHP of 4.14 ± 0.76 μg/g; while the saline solutions had concentration range of DEHP between ND – 0.46 μg/mL. This study established that DEHP leached from most of the polymer packaging bags into the physiological saline solutions