Vitreous humor in the forensic toxicology of quetiapine and its metabolites

Abstract

Abstract Purpose Τhe aim of the present study was to investigate the use of vitreous humor as an alternative biological material in forensic toxicology for the determination of quetiapine, 7-hydroxy-quetiapine, and nor-quetiapine. The distribution of these substances in vitreous humor was studied by determining and correlating their concentrations in vitreous humor with the respective concentrations in blood. Methods During this study, a method for the determination of these substances was developed, validated and applied to postmortem samples obtained from 16 relative forensic cases. The sample preparation procedure included the isolation of the analytes from vitreous humor and blood samples using solid-phase extraction, with Bond Elut LRC C18 columns followed by derivatization with BSTFA with 1% TMCS prior to GC/MS analysis. Results The developed method is characterized by a dynamic range of 10.0–1000.0 ng/mL (R2 ≥ 0.991) for the three substances, with a limit of detection and quantification of 3.0 and 10.0 ng/mL, respectively. Accuracy and precision were below 8.09% and 8.99%, respectively, for both biological materials, while absolute recovery for the three substances was greater than 81%. According to the results, quetiapine, 7-hydroxy-quetiapine, and nor-quetiapine are easily distributed in vitreous humor. Conclusion The results of the study indicate the usefulness of vitreous humor in toxicological analysis for the determination of these substances, especially when the traditional biological materials are not available. The levels of quetiapine and its metabolites in vitreous humor as well as the vitreous humor to blood concentration ratios can provide important information for a more thorough toxicological investigation of forensic cases.