Exposure to high levels of xylene is most likely to occur in workers who smoke and routinely come in contact with solvent products. Xylene is most likely to enter your body through breathing xylene vapors. Less often, xylene enters the body through the skin following direct contact. Exposure to xylene may also take place by eating or drinking xylene- contaminated food or water. Xylene is rapidly absorbed by the lungs following breathing air containing xylene.
Physical exercise increases the amount of xylene absorbed by the lungs.
Absorption of xylene after eating food or drinking water containing it is both rapid and complete. Absorption of xylene through the skin also occurs rapidly following direct contact with xylene or exposure to xylene vapors in the air. At hazardous waste sites, breathing xylene vapors, drinking wellwater contaminated with xylene, and direct contact of the skin with xylene are possible ways you can be exposed. Xylene passes into the blood soon after entering the body. In humans and laboratory animals, xylene is broken down into other chemicals in the liver and lungs.