We measured lipoperoxides, as malondialdehyde (MDA), by liquid chromatography in plasma from 230 male and 148 female adult blood donors, to establish reliable reference values and to compare possible sex-, age-, and specimen-related differences. Our studies show that mean have higher MDA concentrations in plasma than do women (P less than 0.05), older men have higher values than younger men (P less than 0.05), and older women have higher values than young women (P less than 0.001). These age-related results support earlier studies in experimental animals that lipid peroxidation increases with increasing age. In addition, plasma from liquid EDTA-anti-coagulated blood has significantly lower MDA concentrations than does serum or plasma from blood treated with lithium heparin, sodium citrate, or CPDA-1 (P less than 0.001).