Simultaneous determination of 11 monohydroxylated PAHs in human urine by stir bar sorptive extraction and liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry

A simple and sensitive method for simultaneous determination of 11 monohydroxylated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (OH-PAHs) in human urines has been developed based on stir bar sorptive extraction (SBSE) and liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC–MS/MS). Factors that may influence the extraction efficiency, such as pH value of matrix, extraction time, desorption solvents and desorption time were optimized. Validation results showed that the method has high sensitivity (quantification limits of 1–3 pg/mL), good reproducibility (RSD between 3.1 and 13.0%) and spiked recoveries (71.9–133.2%). The proposed method was also applied to analysis urines of smokers and nonsmokers, ten trace OH-PAHs were determined and compared between two groups. For the ease operation and satisfactory validiation results, SBSE coupled to HPLC–MS/MS may be an excellent alternative method for trace analysis of OH-PAHs in human urines.