Adulterants in Toxicology Specimens - Research Paper Example

Adulterants in toxicology specimens For an experiment to be considered efficient so as to relay credible results, itmust be free from any adulterations. As defined by Mikkelsen and Ash (2333) as an adulterant is any substance that is found in other substances such as foods, beverages, fuels, and experimental samples, although they are permitted for legal or other reasons. The process of adding adulterants is termed as adulteration. An adulterant is usually distinct from the permitted chemical samples, such as food additives. However, contamination is used if an unwanted substance is included by accident or negligence rather than intent (Weise). Basically, there are two classes of adulterants. One class includes the commonly available household substances including water, bleach, detergent, eye drops, baking soda, iodine tincture, and vinegar. The opposite classification includes the commercially out there adulterants with the subsequent ingredients: (1) nitrite: klear and whizzies. (2) Acid: “THC-FREE" and "Amber 13". (3) Detergent with purafyzi and test clean. (4) Glutaraldehyde: "Instant Clean Additive."(5) Oxidizing reagents: stealth and clear choic (Levine 5-6). In that sense, adulterants that are added to reduce the amount of expensive product in illicit drugs are termed as cutting agents. According to a view shared Levine (41) numerous biological specimens are usually tested for drug abuse. The compulsory guidelines for workplace drug testing need to make use of the urine as the basis of drug testing matrix. This is attributed to the fact that urine specimens usually have high drug concentrations and also contain metabolites. On the other hand, alternate specimens provide particular advantageous over urine. They include: blood, saliva, semen, breath, earwax, nasal secretions, breast milk, nails, hair, and sebum all have the potential of being drug testing matrices. Blood is viewed to be a very useful matrix if the aim of the testing to determine the relationship between drug concentration and pharmacological effects. In that sense, hair and nails can also detect the long term or chronic use. Generally, the potential benefits of utilizing biological matrices as an alternative to urine include: greater analyte stability, less invasive collection requirements, a lower disease risk, ability to determine parent or the pharmacological active moiety, and easier shipment and storage (42). Urine Regulated workplace drug testing entities use urine as the specimen of choice for determining cocaine metabolite, opiates, amphetamines, and cannabinoids. In the non-regulated drug testing entities it may be used to test for additional drug classes such as ethanol, benzodiazepines, and methadone. Illegal drug users may try to falsify the results by means of in vitro adulteration of specimens (Mikkelsen and Ash 2335). The adulterants can be added to urine so as to interfere with the definitive accuracy of drug tests. Most of these adulterants are oxidative in nature. Bleach, chromate, nitrite, and hydrogen peroxide are viewed as effective urine adulterants sometimes with pH adjusting substances, for instance sodium bicarbonate or vinegar that are utilized by the illegal drug users in order to conceal the positive results of marijuana. A study conducted by Buddha and Jacobs reported that there are many methods that can be used to establish the availability of chromate and nitrite. However, the effects of other oxidizing agents that could probably be used as adulterants and could possibly be hard to detect or measure the level of toxicity in the specimen of urine. According to study conducted by Buddha and Jacobs (460) found out that urine samples containing 9-carboxylic acid THC-acid were actually treated with oxidizing agents that are commonly available. This means that these adulterants can be detected by most drug testing labs’ procedures. However, some less expensive tests do not comprehensively search for them. Since not all the adulterants can be detected, an observed collection is therefore strongly recommended. At a room temperature of 230C and after 5 min, 16 h and 48 h of exposure the specimens were then tested by a gas chromatographic-mass spectrometric method for THC-acid (Buddha and Jacobs 462). Effects of horseradish peroxidase of activity 10 unit/mL and extracts from 2.5 g of black mustard seeds (Brassica nigra), horseradish (Armoracia rusticana), red radish (Raphanus sativus), and Japanese radish (Raphanus sativus), all with 10 mmol/L of hydrogen peroxide, were also studied. At a room temperature of 230 C and after 5 min, 16 h and 48 h of exposure the specimens were then tested by a gas chromatographic-mass spectrometric method for THC-acid. They found out that Read More