Please could you kindly state your purpose of digestion of the blood? Are you doing metal analyses and what are your metals of interest. Answers will determine the type of digestion you will subject your blood to.

Dear Chima,

Thanks for replying. The purpose, is to determine the levels of  heavy metals (namely: Lead, Cadmium & zink ) in blood samples.

Hello Wafa, i've been working with Cd and Pb on animals, soil and plants samples and if you wanna determinate heavy metals in blood you don't need to digest it. 

I use the blood sample and add Triton X-100 as a matrix modifier in a proportion of 1:5 , then mix it 10 minutes (you can do it by hand) and pipette to the graphite furnance directly. 

Greetings.

General protocol for digesting blood samples for heavy metal and arsenic analysis:

Collected Blood in EDTA vials and stored in 40c

Materials:

• Blood sample
• Nitric acid (HNO3)
• Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2)
• Deionized or distilled water
• Conical flask
• Fume hood
• Hot plate or digestion block
• Analytical balance
• Graduated cylinder or pipette

Procedure:

Note: The protocol may vary depending on the type of metal or metalloid being analysed, the analytical technique used, and the equipment available, be sure to follow proper safety protocols, such as working in a fume hood and wearing appropriate personal protective equipment.

References:

1. Welz, B., He, Y., & Sperling, M. (1993). Flow injection on-line acid digestion and pre-reduction of arsenic for hydride generation atomic absorption spectrometry—A feasibility study. Talanta, 40(12), 1917-1926. https://doi.org/10.1016/0039-9140(93)80116-9

2. Liu, M. T., Mao, X. F., Liu, J. X., Ding, L., Na, X., Chen, G. Y., & Qian, Y. Z. (2019). Direct determination of ultratrace arsenic in blood samples using an in-situ dielectric barrier discharge trap coupled with atomic fluorescence spectrometry. Atomic Spectroscopy, 40(3), 83-90.

3. Todorov, T. I., Ejnik, J. W., Mullick, F. G., & Centeno, J. A. (2005). Arsenic speciation in urine and blood reference materials. Microchimica Acta, 151, 263-268.

4. Olmedo, P., Pla, A., Hernández, A. F., López-Guarnido, O., Rodrigo, L., & Gil, F. (2010). Validation of a method to quantify chromium, cadmium, manganese, nickel and lead in human whole blood, urine, saliva and hair samples by electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometry. Analytica Chimica Acta, 659(1-2), 60-67.

Akinloye, O., Ogunleye, K., & Oguntibeju, O. O. (2010). Cadmium, lead, arsenic and selenium levels in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. African journal of biotechnology, 9(32), 5189-5195.