Aim and scope:
Due to the serious toxicological risks and their widespread use,
quantitative determination of phthalates in cosmetic products have importance for public health.
The aim of this study was to develop a validated simple, rapid and reliable high-performance liquid
chromatography (HPLC) method for the determination of phthalates which are; dimethyl phthalate
(DMP), diethyl phthalate (DEP), benzyl butyl phthalate (BBP), di-n-butyl phthalate (DBP), di(2-
ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), in cosmetic products and to investigate these phthalate (PHT) levels
in 48 cosmetic products marketing in Sivas, Turkey.
Materials and Methods:
Separation was achieved by a reverse-phase ACE-5 C18 column (4.6 x
250 mm, 5.0 μm). As the mobile phase, 5 mM KH2PO4 and acetonitrile were used gradiently at 1.5
ml min-1. All PHT esters were detected at 230 nm and the run time was taking 21 minutes.
Results:
This method showed the high sensitivity value the limit of quantification (LOQ) values
for which are below 0.64 μg mL-1 of all phthalates. Method linearity was ≥0.999 (r2). Accuracy and
precision values of all phthalates were calculated between (-6.5) and 6.6 (RE%) and ≤6.2 (RSD%),
respectively. Average recovery was between 94.8% and 99.6%. Forty-eight samples used for both
babies and adults were successfully analyzed by the developed method. Results have shown that,
DMP (340.7 μg mL-1 ±323.7), DEP (1852.1 μg mL-1 ± 2192.0), and DBP (691.3 μg mL-1 ± 1378.5)
were used highly in nail polish, fragrance and cream products, respectively.
Conclusion:
Phthalate esters, which are mostly detected in the content of fragrance, cream and nail
polish products and our research in general, are DEP (1852.1 μg mL-1 ± 2192.0), DBP (691.3 μg
mL-1 ± 1378.5) and DMP (340.7 μg mL-1 ±323.7), respectively. Phthalates were found in the
content of all 48 cosmetic products examined, and the most detected phthalates in general average
were DEP (581.7 μg mL-1 + 1405.2) with a rate of 79.2%. The unexpectedly high phthalate content
in the examined cosmetic products revealed a great risk of these products on human health. The
developed method is a simple, sensitive, reliable and economical alternative for the determination
of phthalates in the content of cosmetic products, it can be used to identify phthalate esters in
different products after some modifications.
Determination of Ten Corticosteroids in Illegal Cosmetic Products by a Simple, Rapid, and High-Performance LC-MS/MS Method