Open Access
Copyright: The authors. This article is an open access
article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) which permits unrestricted use,
distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly
cited.
Research
8.
Examination of the content of heavy metals using
hair samples in dogs of urban areas of Macedonia -
Elena Atanaskova, Goran Nikolovski, Igor Ulčar,
Vangelica Enimiteva
Vet World. 2011; 4(8): 368-370
doi: 10.5455/vetworld.2011.368-370
Abstract
Dogs can be
very good indicators for the environmental
pollution. They share the same environment as
humans and are exposed to action of the same
pollutants. Contamination of the environment with
heavy metals is performed by emissions of
different origin, especially present in the urban
areas. That is why it was great advantage to
analyze the heavy metal levels in dogs from
several urban areas in Macedonia. The objectives
of this study were examination and analyzing the
content of two heavy metals: cadmium and lead in
dogs. For these purposes dog's hair samples were
used. Samples were collected from 35 dogs from
different localities. They were analyzed using the
method of atomic absorption spectrometry.
Statistical data processing was performed. Mean
lead level in the hair samples from Veles, Bitola
and Prilep were: 930.15, 715.66 and 525.63 µg/kg;
while for cadmium were: 54.28, 42.65 and 27.82
µg/kg respectively. According to reference
intervals for hair elements all the values are in
normal ranges (for Cd <100 µg/kg, and for Pb<2000
µg/kg). Comparison of the results between these
areas showed significance in arithmetic means
(<0.05) between Veles and Prilep for Pb and
absolute significance (<0.001) in arithmetic means
for Cd between Veles and Prilep. The study
presents the need for further research in this
area, using dogs as bioindicators.
Keywords:
atomic absorption spectrometry, heavy metals,
dog's hair.
