Abstract
This paper provides a method for evaluating indoor phthalate exposure levels in collected dust, including dust collection, chemical analysis and quality control. Indoor dusts were collected with a self-made equipment and pretreated by the Soxhlet extractor method. Six phthalates, i.e., diethyl phthalate (DEP), di-n-butyl phthalate (DnBP), di-isobutyl phthalate (DiBP), benzyl butyl phthalate (BBzP), di (2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP) and di-isononyl phthalate (DiNP) in the dust were analyzed by gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS). •Measures were taken to avoid background contamination of phthalates during sampling and chemical analysis to accurately evaluate the indoor phthalates exposure levels.•Filter sock and self-made mouthpiece mounted on vacuum cleaner were made of nylon and aluminum respectively.•Dust from surface of plastic products was avoided. The pretreatment of vessels and analysis of blank samples were conducted to reduce "noise" from background contamination.