RESUMO
OBJECTIVE: To establish a method for the determination of formic acid in urine by automatic headspace-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. METHODS: The urine sample was added with 3 mL 15.00%(V/V) sulfuric acid ethanol and heated in an automatic headspace sampler. The formic acid and ethanol underwent an esterification reaction to produce ethyl formate which was separated by gas chromatographic column and detected by mass spectrometer. The quantification was based on external standard method. RESULTS: The linear range of the method was 2.93-97.60 mg/L, with the regression equation correlation coefficient of 0.999 5. The detection limit was 0.65 mg/L and the minimum quantitative limit was 2.17 mg/L, with the recoveries of 95.61%-106.47%. The within-run relative standard deviation(RSD) ranged from 2.52% to 8.05% and the between-run RSD ranged from 6.58% to 8.42%. CONCLUSION: The method has simple pretreatment, good specificity, high precision and has little interference. It is suitable for large scale rapid determination of formic acid in urine in occupational contact population, patients with acute methanol poisoning and general population.