Original Article
European Journal of Clinical Nutrition (2006) 60, 421–425. doi:10.1038/sj.ejcn.1602334; published online 14 December 2005
Restricted intraindividual urinary iodine concentration variability in nonfasting subjects
Guarantors: B Busnardo, C Mian and ME Girelli.
Contributors: BB, CM and MEG are co-principal investigators and are responsible for writing the manuscript; LZ and MP performed the UIC analyses, DN abstracted and analysed the data, performed the statistics and graphs.
B Busnardo1, D Nacamulli1, L Zambonin1, C Mian1, M Piccolo1 and M E Girelli1
1Endocrinology Unit, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, University of Padua, Padua, Italy
Correspondence: Dr B Busnardo, Endocrinology Unit, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, Via Ospedale n.105, 35128 Padua, Italy. E-mail: benedetto.busnardo@unipd.it
Received 23 September 2004; Revised 9 September 2005; Accepted 20 September 2005; Published online 14 December 2005.
Abstract
Objective:
Individual urinary iodine concentration (UIC) reflects iodine intake over a short time prior to sampling. Since eating habits are relatively constant in single subjects, UIC should be relatively constant in a given individual. The aim of our study was to verify this hypothesis by assessing UIC in repeated single urine samples from a group of healthy subjects.
Design and Setting:
A prospective sequential investigation was performed in 131 volunteer health workers or students recruited in our University hospital.
Interventions:
Single urine samples were taken in a nonfasting state, between 0900 and 1100 hours. Group 1 was composed by 131 subjects who collected one urine sample. Group 2 was composed by 11 subjects of the group 1, who collected multiple repeated urine samples (as a whole 158 urine samples, mean 14 samples each). UIC mean
s.d., median and coefficient of variation (CV%) was measured in both groups.
Results:
Interindividual UIC variation was wide, UIC ranging from 21 to 382 
g/l, mean 13684 g/l, median 124 g/l, CV 62%. Also in the 11 subjects repeatedly sampling there were considerable differences among individual UIC average levels (ranging from 3715 to 22191 g/l). However, in this second group, the intraindividual variation was considerably restricted (CV% 36).
Conclusions:
The present study shows that in a nonfasting state in mid-morning UIC is more stable from day to day in a single subject, depending on his eating habits, than in various subjects. Thus, a single urine sample even in nonfasting state may give some rough information about the individual's iodine status.
Keywords:
thyroid, Italy, milk, diet, urinary iodine concentration, iodine supply
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