Rapid urinary iodide test.

Assessment of iodine deficiency and monitoring of iodine supplementation programs demand rapid, simple, and cost-effective methods for the determination of urinary iodide concentrations. We propose a semiquantitative rapid test, based on the iodide-catalyzed oxidation of 3,3',5,5'-tetramethylbenzidine by peracetic acid/H2O2, to yield colored products. The color of the chemical reaction is compared with color categories of a pictogram corresponding to three ranges: <100, 100-300, and >300 microg/L (<0.79, 0.79-2.36, and >2.36 micromol/L) of iodide concentrations. The test is very easy to perform and does not require any instrumentation or apparatus. Sample preparation is simple and consists of the removal of interfering substances by disposable columns, 65 x 10.5 mm, packed with purified activated charcoal. For comparison with a reference method for measuring urinary iodide, by high-performance liquid chromatography, we determined the iodide concentrations of 370 random (untimed) urine samples from consecutive patients by both high-performance liquid chromatography and the rapid test. The results obtained by both methods are in close agreement, with respect to classification of the samples according to the above three ranges, with a maximum difference of less than 5% for each range. Median (y) values of a given distribution of urinary iodide concentrations can be calculated from the percent (x) of samples below 100 microg/L (0.79 micromol/L) using the regression equation: y = 179.78 - 1.60x. This rapid test, therefore, is suited to epidemiological surveys of iodine deficiency, especially in developing countries.