Skip to main content
. 2016 Mar 29;23:12835–12866. doi: 10.1007/s11356-016-6503-x

Table 2.

Relevant information related to preconcentration steps and analysis of environmental water samples for diclofenac, E2, and EE2 determination. Costs listed refer to the different analytical options, without considering those related to instrument investment or the possibility, for each method, to be capable of determining several compounds simultaneously (multiresidual analysis). In any case, limiting the determination only to a restricted number of target compounds could be considered a too simplistic approach which might not be useful to fully take advantage of the potentialities of the instrumentation nowadays available

Sample Preparation steps Recovery (%) Analytical technique LOQ (μg L−1) Analysis time and difficultya Analysis costs (€/sample)b Reference
Diclofenac
 Wastewater influent and effluent 1. Filtration
2. SPE preconcentration
3. Derivatization
100 GC-MS/MS 0.05 +++ 40–60 Carballa et al. (2004, 2005, 2007)
 raw industrial and municipal wastewater, surface, ground, drinking water 1. Acidification
2. SPE pre-concentration
3. IS addition
55–116 LC-ESI-MS/MS 0.012–0.02 ++ 30–50 Gros et al. (2006a, b, 2009, 2012), Petrović et al. (2014)
 Wastewater influent and effluent, groundwater 1. Filtration
2. SPE preconcentration
3. Derivatization
55–100 GC-MS 0.025 +++ 40–60 Ternes (1998, 2001), Ternes et al. (2003)
 Wastewater influent and effluent, basin water 1. Acidification
2. IS addition
3. SPE preconcentration
100 LC/ESI-MS/MS >0.03 ++ 30–50 Sacher et al. (2008), Oosterhuis et al. (2013)
 Wastewater influent and effluent 1. Acidification
2. IS addition
3. SPE preconcentration
100 UHPLC-MS/MS 0.05–0.14 ++ 30–50 Gracia-Lor et al. (2010, 2011)
 River water, WWTP effluent 1. Addition of deuterated standards
2. Acidification
3. SPE preconcentration
4. IS addition
99 LC/ESI/MS 0.02 ++ Letzel et al. (2009)
 Wastewater influent and effluent 1. Acidification
2. SPE preconcentration
3. Derivatization
65–85 GC/ion trap-MS/MS 0.12 +++ 40–60 Serrano et al. (2011)
 River, wastewater influent and effluent 1. Filtration
2. SPE preconcentration
3. Derivatization
56–112 UHPLC-MS/MS 0.006–0.012 +++ 40–60 Huang et al. (2011)
E2 and EE2
 Surface water and wastewater 1. Filtration (1.5 μm)
2. SDB-XC disk extraction
3. SPE (C18 and NH2)
4. HPLC elution
5. Derivatization
88–92 GC/ion trap-MS/MS 0.1–2.4 +++ 40–60 Belfroid et al. (1999)
 Wastewater influent and effluent, rivers 1. Filtration (1.5 μm)
2. SPE preconcentration
3. Addition of IS
80–92 LC/ESI-MS/MS 0.008–0.8 ++ 30–50 Baronti et al. (2000)
 Wastewater influent and effluent, anaerobic digester influent and effluent 1. Filtration (1.5 μm)
2. SPE purification/preconcentration
3. Derivatization
82–84 GC/ion trap-MS/MS 1 +++ 40–60 Ternes (1998), Carballa et al. (2004, 2005, 2007)
 Synthetic, wastewater influent and effluent, surface waters 1. Filtration (1.5 μm)
2. MeOH and IS addition
3. SPE purification/preconcentration
4. Derivatization
79–100 GC/ion trap-MS/MS 3–20 +++ 40–60 Quintana et al. (2004)
 Surface water, wastewater influent and effluent 1. Filtration 65–105 LC/LC-MS/MS 0.002–0.003 +++ 20–40 Gorga et al. (2013)

a+: low, ++: moderate, +++: high

bAnalysis cost was estimated including the cost of the column (lasting about 500 injections) and SPE cartridge and amortization of instrumentation (lasting 5 years)