The toxicity and accumulation of mercury compounds in dentistry has been an issue of interesting concern. A few data was available concerning the relation between toxicity and accumulation of inorganic mercury in vivo.
The purpose of the study was to investigate the accumulation of mercury in rat tissues following exposure to different volumes of mercurous chloride.
. For this study, 44 Sprague-Dawley strain rats were divided into three large groups. The rats of group I were supplied with a drinking water ad libitum, group II were fed 0.945mg HgCl2 per 100gm of body weight and 3.780mg HgCl2 per 100gm of body weight in group M. The rats were fed the mercurous chloride as solution type everyday via gastric lavage method for 2 and 4 weeks. The author collected the samples of hair, whole blood, kidney and liver and melted them in acid digestion bomb. The total mercury contents of hair, blood, kidney and liver were determined by Cold Vapour Atomic Absorption Spectrometry.
The results obtained were as follows
The hair mercury contents of group II & III were 2-4 times higher than that of the control. The mean mercury levels of whole blood were 0.09ppm (range 0.01-0.25) in control group, 0.34ppm (range 0.09-0.61) in group II and 0.76ppm (range 0.48-1.06) in group III during 4 weeks. The kidney was the main reservoir of mercury in body. The mean mercury levels of kidney were 0.16ppm (range 0.09-0.26) in control group, 60.98ppm (range 32.18-96.45) in group II and 102.45ppm (range 73.89-142.09) in group III. There was significant difference of mercury content in kidney between groups (p<0.05). The mean mercury levels of liver throughout 4 weeks were 0.06, 2.46 and 3.46ppm in group I, group II and, group III, respectively. In control group, hair mercury content was the highest and kidney, whole blood, liver in descending order, but in group II and III, kidney mercury content was the highest and liver, hair, whole blood in descending order (p<0.05). There was significant correlation ship between kidney mercury content and liver mercury content (r=0.8348, p<0.05), but there were no correlation ship among the other samples.
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