Objective: To develop a method for the rapid determination of ethanol in blood with capillary-GC.
Methods: 0.50 mL of whole blood sample was taken and added with 1.00 mL of dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), and 2 g of anhydrous sodium sulfate. The supernatant of the sample solution was directly injected into GC for analysis.
Results: Ethanol was separated from other substances in the sample. The liner range of ethanol detected by the capillary-GC was 0.0-300.0 mg/100 mL, and the detection limit was 0.2 mg/100 mL. The RSD for standard solution determination was 1.36%. Satisfactory results were obtained for the determination of ethanol in whole blood samples, with recoveries ranging from 90.9% to 107.3% and a RSD of 1.98%. The combined uncertainty was 2.2%.
Conclusion: This is a rapid, sensitive and simple method for determination of ethanol in large quantities of samples. The method has shortened the duration of analysis cycle in comparison with the traditional headspace-GC, with a reduction from 20-30 min to less than 10 min.