Abstract.
A method based on the principle of gel separation followed by antibody extraction (GSAE) has been developed for isolation of radioactive thyroxine (T4), 3,5,3'-triiodothyronine (T3), 3,3',5'-triiodothyronine (rT3), 3,3'-diiodothyronine (3,3'-T2), 3',5'-diiodothyronine (3',5'-T2) and 3'-monoiodothyronine (3'-T1) in serum. This method was used for the estimation of the metabolic clearance rate (MCR) of the iodothyronines using the single injection, non-compartmental approach, and was compared to the conventional trichloroacetic acid precipitation/ethanol extraction (TCA-E) technique. The GSAE method excluded the co-determination of radioactive iodine and iodoproteins, whereas the co-determination of radiolabelled daughter iodothyronines was found negligible. The relative difference of duplicate estimations of MCR was approximately 10%. Using the TCA-E method for isolation of tracer, the MCR of T4, T3 and rT3 was underestimated to a minor degree (20%), whereas the MCRs of 3,3'-T2, 3',5'-T2 and 3'-T1 were 20–40% of those estimated by the GSAE method. In conclusion the GSAE method was found suitable for kinetic studies of iodothyronines, whereas the TCA-E method cannot be used for turnover studies of 3,3'-T2, 3',5'-T2 or 3'-T1.