Objective: The objective of this study was to evaluate some toxic levels of nail cosmetics marketed in Seoul, Korea and health risk assessment on humans.
Methods: We collected 45 random nail cosmetics and analysed for lead, cadmium, arsenic and antimony by inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES).
Results: Four metals concentrations were Pb 0.037 ± 0.083 (<LOD ∼ 0.322) mg/kg, Cd 0.021 ± 0.058 (<LOD ∼ 0.342) mg/kg, As 0.094 ± 0.278 (<LOD ∼ 1.696) mg/kg and Sb 6.75 ± 17.54 (<LOD ∼ 59.017) mg/kg respectively. The concentrations of antimony were significantly higher than other metal concentrations (p < 0.05) and Sb concentrations in 6 samples were above the acceptable limits in Korea. As the result of the health risk assessment, MoS, HQ and HI values for Pb, As and Cd were within the permissible limit, but outside the acceptable range of Sb. LCR value was lower than the allowed limit for all nail cosmetics.
Discussion and conclusion: Six nail cosmetics had high antimony concentrations which were higher than the current legal limit in Korea. Because of 6 high antimony concentrations, MoS, HQ and HI were outside the acceptable range. LCR value for Pb, As and Cd was below 1 0 -6 which was lower than the permissible limit and nail cosmetics may not possess lifetime cancer risk. Our results suggested that metals were present in nail cosmetics at diverse concentrations and some nail cosmetics appeared to pose a harmful impact on health.
Keywords: ICP-OES; Nail cosmetics; Seoul; health risk assessment; heavy metals.