Development and validation of a direct headspace GC‐FID method for the determination of sevoflurane, desflurane and other volatile compounds of forensic interest in biological fluids: Application on clinical and post‐mortem samples

Abstract

A simple and reliable headspace GC-flame ionization detection (HS-GC-FID) method has been developed and validated for the simultaneous determination of seven volatile compounds of forensic interest: sevoflurane, desflurane, ethanol, methanol, 1-propanol, acetone and acetaldehyde. All seven compounds including acetonitrile (internal standard) eluted within 10 min and were well resolved with no endogenous interference. Good linearity was observed in the range of 1-12 mg/dL for both anesthetics and 2.5-40 mg/dL for the other five analytes. The method showed good precision, sensitivity and repeatability. Most of the analytes remained stable during the storage of samples at 4°C. Desflurane and acetone degraded (>10%), when the samples remained on the autosampler for more than 2 and 3 h, respectively. The method was finally applied on clinical and post-mortem blood and urine samples. The clinical samples were collected both from patients who underwent surgery, as well as from the occupationally exposed medical and nursing staff of the university hospital, working in the operating rooms. The hospital staff samples were found negative for all compounds, while the patients' samples were found positive for the anesthetic administered to the patient. The post-mortem blood samples were found positive for ethanol and acetaldehyde.

Enhanced Characterization of the Smell of Death by Comprehensive Two-Dimensional Gas Chromatography-Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry (GCxGC-TOFMS)

“…drugs, ethanol) on decaying corpse opens up new possibilities in forensic toxicology. Recent research has been conducted into the development of direct headspace sampling methods to analyze volatile compounds of forensic interest in human biological fluids [68]–[69].…”

Alcohol Affects the Brain's Resting-State Network in Social Drinkers

“…The Saliva Alcohol Concentration (SAC) was determined by head-space gas chromatography coupled with a flame ionization detector. All analyses were performed with an in-house method previously developed and fully validated in [41]. The SAC achieved was 0.665 g/L±0.17 and no significant difference was observed between males and females (p = .875, F (1, 25) = .026).…”

Uncertainty of Blood Alcohol Concentration (BAC) Results as Related to Instrumental Conditions: Optimization and Robustness of BAC Analysis Headspace Parameters

“…Equation 1 is the general equation used to perform external standard quantification. The concentration values of the calibration curve were plotted along the x-axis, while the corresponding ethanol peak areas were plotted along the y-axis [20]. A line of best fit was determined from the scatter points in order to determine the unknown ethanol concentration (x) of the continuing calibration verification samples.…”

“…The same RRF values were used for both 0.02g/dL and 0.08 g/dL since the value represents the entire calibration curve as a whole. Equation 6 was used to calculate the percent relative standard deviation that was used in order to determine the precision and repeatability of the blood alcohol concentration analysis at the common threshold value, 0.08 g/dL, and 0.02 g/dL [20]. The standard deviation and mean were calculated using the function tool within the Excel (Microsoft Corp).…”