Workplace assessment of exposure to 2-ethoxyethanol

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Abstract
In recent years, certain monoalkyl glycol ethers have become implicated as potential reproductive toxins. One of the more suspect members of the family showing teratogenic effects in pregnant female rodents, as well as testicular toxicity in male rodents, has been 2-ethoxyethanol. Researchers from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) have searched for several years to locate a population of occupationally exposed workers for study to determine whether adverse reproductive health effects occur. A population of roughly 100 exposed workers was identified on the West coast of the United States where exposure was adequately high to justify an evaluation of their reproductive health status. This paper presents industrial hygiene and biomonitoring data which were collected in conjunction with a reproductive epidemiology study. The levels measured in this survey ranged from nondetectable to 23.8 ppm (for an 8-hour time-weighted average), and a biomonitoring effort was undertaken to determine if metabolites of the chemical could be detected in the urine of exposed workers or if the parent compound could be detected in their blood. One of the suspected major metabolites of 2-ethoxyethanol is 2-ethoxyacetic acid, and detection of this metabolite in urine would confirm exposure and biological uptake of the chemical with greater validity than breathing zone sampling alone. No evidence of 2-ethoxyethanol was detected in any of the blood samples; however, exposed workers were found to have measurable levels of the metabolite in urine (up to 163 mg/g creatinine), while unexposed control subjects showed nondetectable urine levels of this compound. The study demonstrated that urinary monitoring is a promising method for assessing exposure to 2-ethoxyethanol, particularly when skin absorption is suspected.

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