• Karla A Moore, Barry Levine, Jack M Titus, and David R Fowler.
• Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, State of Maryland, 111 Penn Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21201, USA.
• J Anal Toxicol. 2003 Nov 1;27(8):592-4.

AbstractA case of intoxication from the oral hypoglycemic drug metformin is presented. A number of published liquid chromatographic methods were combined to enable a simplified analysis of metformin in both antemortem and postmortem specimens. The method involved direct injection of a protein-free filtrate into the liquid chromatograph. The method was sufficiently sensitive to detect therapeutic use of metformin; no common therapeutic or abused drugs interfered with the assay. In the presented case, the hospital admission serum metformin concentration was 141 mg/L, or approximately two orders of magnitude above therapeutic concentrations. The medical examiner concluded that the cause of death in this case was metformin intoxication, and the manner of death was suicide.

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