Occurrence and stability of inorganic and organic arsenic species in wines, rice wines and beers from Central European market.

We investigated in total 80 wine samples of different types and seven grape juice and 23 beer samples purchased from markets in Central Europe in order to understand the arsenic (As) speciation and help assess the potential As toxicity via intake of alcoholic beverages. Generally, total As concentrations in most samples investigated were below the drinking water limit 10 µg l(-1) published by the World Health Organization (WHO); ranging from 0.46 to 21.0 µg l(-1) As in red and white wines and from 0.75 to 13.4 µg l(-1) As in beers. In addition, concentrations of total As in rice wine and in rice beer were 0.63-6.07 and 3.69-8.23 µg l(-1) As, respectively. The total As concentrations in ice wine ranged from 7.94 to 18.8 µg l(-1) As, significantly higher than in white and red wine. Arsenite predominated as the As species in most of the wine samples, whereas arsenate was the dominant species in rice wine, beer and rice beer. Methyl As components were usually minor components in all wine and beer samples. Monomethylarsonic acid, dimethylarsinic acid and two additional unknown As species were frequently found in grape juice, late harvest and ice wine with higher sweetness. After air exposure, arsenite, arsenate, monomethylarsonic acid and dimethylarsinic acid were stable at 4°C for months, probably due to the acidic conditions of wine and beer samples. The presence of sulfite had little influence on As speciation in wine. Despite the predominance of more toxic arsenite and arsenate in wine and beer, the estimated weekly exposure to As (via consumption of beer, wine and rice wine) is low. The As intake per capita is 6.81 µg from beer, <1.93 µg from wine and 0.88 µg from rice wine, estimated using the median of total As concentration multiplied by the average consumption per capita of the corresponding beverage.

Derivation and validation of a sensitive IMA cutpoint to predict cardiac events in patients with chest pain.

OBJECTIVES: In patients with acute chest pain, we derived a cutpoint for ischaemia-modified albumin (IMA) and prospectively validated this cutpoint to predict 30-day major adverse cardiac events (MACEs). METHODS: We prospectively recruited a derivation cohort (18-month period) to establish a serum IMA cutpoint targeting 80% sensitivity. This was followed by a prospective validation cohort study of emergency department patients with acute chest pain at two university hospitals over a 3-month period. A MACE was defined as myocardial infarction, revascularisation or death at 30-day follow-up. RESULTS: In the derivation cohort of 151 patients, the IMA cutpoint that achieved 80% sensitivity for MACEs was 75 KU/litre. The sensitivity was prospectively validated in 171 patients consecutively enrolled, of whom 106 underwent multiple-biomarker analysis (19.8% MACE rate, 81% sensitivity of IMA). Furthermore, IMA by itself (81%, p<0.01) and in combination with initial highly sensitive cardiac troponin T (hsTnT) (90%, p<0.001) had significantly higher sensitivity than initial hsTnT (29%) for prediction of MACEs. CONCLUSIONS: We prospectively validated the sensitive IMA cutpoint of 75 KU/litre with 80% sensitivity for MACEs in patients with acute chest pain. Our data suggest that IMA alone and in combination with initial hsTnT are more sensitive than the initial hsTnT for MACEs.