Incredible pharmaceutical residues in human milk in a cohort study from Şanlıurfa in Turkey

Maternal milk is essential for optimum growth and development of an infant. The aim was to examine the presence of pharmaceutical residuals in breastmilk. This cohort study enrolled 90 healthy mother-infant pairs at 5-14 days after delivery and a control examination was performed 4-8 weeks later. Milk samples were taken at both visits. RANDOX Infiniplex kit performed residual analysis. More than half of mothers (54.4 %) had anti-inflammatory drug residues in at least one milk sample: those were 52.2 % for tolfenamic acid and 2.2 % for meloxicam and 1.1 % for metamizole. The most frequent residue group included the beta-lactam antibiotic group, which was detected in 93.3 % of mothers' milk. The second one was the quinolone group (81.1 %). One-third of mothers expressed nitroxynil and one-fifth polymyxin in at least one sample. Almost all mothers had some unexpected drug residues in their milk. Additional studies from other countries can display maternal environmental exposures.