Measurement of phenol and p-cresol in urine and feces using vacuum microdistillation and high-performance liquid chromatography.

In this article, we describe a simple, sensitive, accurate, and repeatable method for the measurement of phenol and p-cresol (4-methylphenol) in human urine and feces. We examined a number of parameters to identify an optimal extraction protocol. Purification of sample extracts was achieved by low-temperature vacuum microdistillation.