Fayixue Zazhi (Apr 2020)

Retention Time and Ion Abundance Ratio of 8 Common Drugs (Poisons) by LC-MS/MS Qualitative Analysis#br#

  • MIN Tao, LIU Shao-dan, XIN Guo-bin, et al.

DOI
https://doi.org/10.12116/j.issn.1004-5619.2020.02.013
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 36, no. 2
pp. 216 – 222

Abstract

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Objective To investigate the maximum allowable deviations of retention time and ion abundance ratio of the 8 common drugs (poisons) from 3 categories, poisons (methamphetamine, morphine, ketamine), benzodiazepines (estazolam, midazolam, diazepam, clonazepam) and barbiturates (phenobarbital) in blood, by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) in forensic toxicology analysis. Methods The deviations of retention time and ion abundance ratio at 7 low mass concentrations, limit of detection (LOD), 2LOD, limit of quantitation (LOQ), 1.5LOQ, 2LOQ, 4LOQ and 6LOQ, were tested by LC-MS/MS after liquid-liquid extraction under the conditions of two chromatographic columns and three chromatographs. Results The deviation of absolute retention time of 98.11% of 8 drugs (poisons) in the blood samples was within the range of ±0.05 min, and that of the relative retention time of 96.21% was within the range of ±0.4%. The maximum deviation of the ion abundance ratio was highly correlated with the mass concentration. When the mass concentration of drugs (poisons) was LOQ or above, more than 95% of the absolute deviation and relative deviation of the ion abundance ratio were in the range of ±25% and ±40%, respectively; when the mass concentration was below LOQ, the range could be expanded to ±35% and ±50%, respectively. Conclusion It is recommended for the determination range of the absolute retention time deviation of 8 common drugs (poisons) to be ±0.1 min and that of the relative retention time deviation to be ±1.0%. The determination range of absolute deviation of the ion abundance ratio should be ±25% when the mass concentration is LOQ or above, and the relative deviation should be ±40%. When the mass concentration is below LOQ, the deviation determination range can be expanded to ±35% and ±50%, respectively.

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