The 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health

 Objective:

To measure levels of nicotine and cotinine in urine of Indian smokers and non-smokers. 

Methods:

High Pressure Liquid Chromatography assay.

Results:  

Group	Nicotine (ng/ml)	Cotinine (ng/ml)
Cigarette smoker (n=30)	703.50±304.34	2736.20±983.29
Bidi smokers (n=30)	268.53±97.62	562.60±249.38
Hooka smokers (n=10)	548.0±103.47	2379.0±424.25
Tobacco chewers (n=20)	544.75±103.47	2178.30±334.29
Passive smokers (n=20)	109.75±22.33	280.75±86.3
Never smokers (n=20)	55.0±13.71	7.30±2.74

ANOVA     P <0.001 The concentration of nicotine and cotinine in urine was highest in cigarette smoking group and lowest in bidi smoking group.  This could be due to variation in the amount of tobacco in the cigarette as bidi.  The value of cotinine and nicotine were higher in all smokers compared to passive smokers and non-smokers.  The value of cotinine and nicotine were high for cigarette smokers followed by Hooka, tobacco chewer, bidi, passive smokers and non-smokers. As the nicotine excretion increase the cotinine excretion also increases.  The amount of mean nicotine concentration in passive group was 110 ng/ml and cotinine 281 ng/ml, this could be due to the amount of tobacco smoke inhalation.  In non-smoker group living with non-smoker group the concentration of mean nicotine 55 ng/ml and cotinine was 7.30 ng/ml.  The concentration was negligible statistically.  This means that there can be some other factors, which are responsible for the excretion of nicotine and cotinine in urine eg. dietic factor, environmental factor. Thus cotinine and nicotine levels in urine are good indicators of exposure to toabacco use.