Forensic science international
-
We report on a case of repeated MDPV consumptions that resulted in severe psychosis and agitation prompting the concomitant abuse of benzodiazepines. A 27-year-old man was found irresponsive in his apartment and was brought to the emergency department (ED) of a local hospital. When in ED, he rapidly recovered and self-reported to have recently injected some doses of MDPV that he had bought in the Internet. ⋯ LC-HRMS/MS was use to determine the following concentrations, respectively on his first and second admission: MDPV 55ng/mL, alprazolam 114ng/mL, α-hydroxyalprazolam 104ng/mL; MDPV 35ng/mL, alprazolam 10.4ng/mL, α -hydroxyalprazolam 13ng/mL; chlordiazepoxide 13ng/mL, temazepam 170ng/mL, diazepam 1.3ng/mL, nordiazepam 61.5, oxazepam 115ng/mL. The toxicological findings corroborated the referred concomitant use of multiple pharmaceutical drugs and benzodiazepines. Confirmation of previous hypothesis on human metabolism of MDPV could be inferred by the analysis of urine.
-
An UPLC-MS/MS method using ESI+ionization and MRM was developed and fully validated according to international guidelines for the qualitative and quantitative analysis of nine synthetic cannabinoids and/or their metabolites in urine samples (1mL). Prior to extraction the samples were subjected to an enzymatic hydrolysis using β-glucuronidase followed by a SPE procedure using Oasis(®) HLB 3cc (60mg) columns. The chromatographic separation was performed with an Acquity UPLC(®) HSS T3 (50mm×2.1mm i.d., 1.8μm) reversed-phase column using a gradient with methanol-ammonium formate 2mM (0.1% formic acid) and with a run time of 9.5min. ⋯ The method was applied to 80 authentic samples, five of them (6.2%) were confirmed or suspected to be positive for the metabolites JWH-018 N-hydroxypentyl and JWH-018 N-pentanoic acid of JWH-018 and for the metabolite JWH-122 N-(5-hydroxypentyl) of JWH-122, and three of them in association with THC and/or THCCOOH (substances included in the method, together with the 11-OH-THC). Additionally, 17 spice products were analyzed, for which were confirmed the presence of the following substances: AM-2201, JWH-018, JWH-022 JWH-073, JWH-122, JWH-203, JWH-210, JWH-250, HU-210 and RCS-4, according to the comparison with authentic reference material and published data. The analytical method developed allowed the analysis of synthetic cannabinoids and the notification of the first cases in Portugal.